


Put On Your Warpaint

by PyromanicSchizophrenic



Category: Bandom, Fall Out Boy, Panic! at the Disco, Twenty One Pilots
Genre: Alternate Universe - Apocalypse
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-01-07
Updated: 2016-12-04
Packaged: 2018-05-12 08:22:10
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 27
Words: 76,828
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5659393
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/PyromanicSchizophrenic/pseuds/PyromanicSchizophrenic
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>It was a beautiful day for an outdoor show. The sun was shining, the birds were singing, the crowd was enthusiastic, there were grey-skinned monsters attacking backstage--wait, WHAT?</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. The Kids Aren't Alright

If anyone thought her odd, no one said anything. If anyone thought her a threat, no one made a move. If anyone thought her one to be feared, no one screamed.

She was thankful, in a sense, for the universal cloud of naïve blindness that had settled upon human kind. It made it simpler for her to get in and out, unnoticed. The only problem was that it also made it possible for _Them_ to pass through, to make _Their_ plans and prepare the world to _Their_ liking.

Until today, as she understood it. Today, that changed. The world’s eyes would open, the curtain would rise. They would see, for the first time since the beginning. They would see what she saw. And it would start with the four men on that stage.

Moving through the crowd was difficult, to say the least. The people shot her dirty looks with every elbow to the side. There was too much screaming for her tastes, too much movement for her comfort. It would be all too easy to be shoved too hard and lose a blade.

Blades were crucial these days, and even more so in the days to come. To lose one would be a disaster. But it would be worth it, when compared to the consequences of failing her self-assigned mission. Keep them safe. Even if she didn’t know why they were important, _They_ thought they were. And anything _They_ wanted, anything _They_ thought _They_ needed…She needed more. She needed to keep away. So she kept moving, pushing and shoving her way through screaming girls and moshing teens. It was the only way.

“ _Fall to your knees, bring on the rapture,_ ” sang the blond man in a hat, taking his hands from his guitar to hold the mic. “ _Blessed be the boys time can’t capture._ ”

“Careful what you wish for, man,” she mumbled, glancing past him in an attempt to see into the wings. Somehow, she’d managed to get just three rows back from the end. _Damn_. She’d forgotten about the gate, and security standing behind it. Between the crowd and the band, keeping them from getting jumped. They’d notice her. They’d notice her weapons. She wouldn’t get past them. She’d have to wait for the attack. “So much for preemptive.”

Waiting was agony. She’d done too much of it—waiting to die, waiting to escape, waiting to plan. Today, here, she felt like she was waiting to lose hope. If she couldn’t get to them fast enough, then there might not be a chance left. Her contact swore that they could change the outcome, that they could stop everything. But there was still a barrier of people, and a literal barrier besides, to get past once the time came. But she dared not go closer, lest the guards notice her before pandemonium erupted and chaos ensued.

Just as she began to panic, worry that _They_ would not strike until the four men were backstage, someone screamed from offstage. The bassist glanced into the stage left wing and staggered away, tripping over the riser he had only just hopped off of. She vowed to herself that she would sigh and shake her head as soon as they were safe. If he was one of the ones destined to save the world, then the world was fucked.

But now was not the time to express any kind of displeasure at this bassist’s lack of coordination. Now was the chance. Pandemonium, chaos, and security had turned their backs as grey skinned humanoids stepped onto the stage. Pawns, she noted. She shoved her way through the last of the crowd, climbed on top of the barrier, and leapt onto the stage, drawing her katana off her back in one fluid motion and stepping in front of the fallen musician and one of the Pawns.

“Get up and get _out_ ,” she growled at him, raising her sword and leveling it at the Pawn in front of her.

“I—What?” he stammered. “Who…how…?”

She groaned internally. “Fuck it,” she snapped. “All four of you, _run_.”

“Which way!?” one of them shouted. “They’re everywhere!”

Just as she was about to answer, a Pawn off to her side lunged at her. She swiped the blade in a wide arc, slicing an impressive gash across its chest. A deep blue liquid spilled out. “Follow me,” she commanded evenly, stepping on the neck of the still-twitching body on the ground. She spun around. “Or stand around here and wait to die.” The four shared a significant look before crossing the stage and joining her, sticking close as she cut a path and started running.

The five of them looked a funny sight: a young woman carrying tens of knives and a katana, closely followed by Fall Out Boy, sprinting through the streets of Washington, DC.

* * *

 

She could tell they were frustrated with her. It showed in the looks they shot in her direction. But that was all irrelevant. She had to get them safe. She had to make sure they would make it. Because if the Pawns (or the worse things to come) didn’t kill them, then their terrible shapes would.

“Jesus fuck, don’t any of you ever run?” she snapped, pulling them into an alley to let them catch their breaths. Only the shirtless drummer appeared to have any sort of composure, but even he was breathing hard and flushed red.

“Only from hordes of screaming fangirls,” the bassist supplied. She realized she’d actually have to learn their names, and cursed herself for never listening to her best friend when she ranted about them all those months ago.

“The run-for-your-life thing’s pretty new,” the drummer added.

She rolled her eyes. “Isn’t there adrenaline or something?” she demanded. “Makes this possible for you? We’ve still got five blocks to go.”

“You wanna tell us who the fuck you are?” the wild-haired guitarist snapped. “I’m not crazy about following an armed stranger to some mystery location.”

“Think of it as incentive,” she hissed. “Make it to shelter, and I’ll answer your questions.” Peering around the corner and not looking back at the musicians, she took off again.

The sounds of four sets of pounding feet (and her nearly-silent footsteps) were drowned by the sounds of screaming and panicking flooding the city streets. The huffing and wheezing as they lost what little composure she’d allowed them to regain was nearly lost as a window nearby broke and a streetlamp exploded (later she would marvel at how streetlamps were always the first to go). She knew she was running too fast, pushing them too far, but they’d never make it as they stood. She’d have to push them.

She rounded a corner sighed in relief. The old church sat directly ahead, as if waiting for her. She ran around to the side door, the one leading directly into the sanctuary, and pulled the heavy door open. As the men, her charges, staggered up the three steps and in through the door she held for them, she glanced around, making sure her safe haven had yet to be discovered. The pawns hadn’t followed them more than a few blocks. It unsettled her.

Once the door shut behind her, she let herself really _look_ at the four lives she’d just gone through so much trouble to save. They were red-faced, sweaty, two of them were still carrying guitars, one a bass, and they looked about ready to keel over and make all that effort fruitless.

“If you think you can make it, there’s water upstairs,” she offered curtly, leaning against the wall.

The bassist glared up at her from the pew they’d all collapsed into. “You just made us run…however fucking far this was, and now you want us to go upstairs?”

Her eyes narrowed. She was far from in the mood to deal with their foul tempers, and she had one of her own that would make the devil himself cringe in fear. “ _I_ did not make anyone do _anything_ ,” she hissed. “You could have stayed behind, died with your crew and your fans. _You_ followed _me_. I saved your lives, do not make me regret it. I would love nothing more than to throw you right back on the streets with nothing but your _charm_ and your _good looks_ to save you. Do not tempt me.”

“Then why’d you save us?” the bassist shot right back. She could tell he was the most vocal of the group. He would also be the one she would want to kill the most. “If you’d rather we died, why not let us?”

“Pete,” the vocalist muttered, finally ducking out of his guitar strap and laying it carefully upright against the pew in front of him.

She didn’t answer—didn’t know how, to be honest. She needed to speak with her contact, let him know that the ones _They_ were after were safe. And they were idiots. Find out what the next step was—did he know _Their_ plan yet? What was their part in this? She refused to tell them anything until she knew for sure. As it stood, she knew one thing: she _needed_ them to trust her enough for her to save them, to train them. And that wouldn’t happen so long as her answer to any of their questions was “I don’t know.” So rather than tell the bassist—Pete—that she saved him because _They_ wanted them dead, and anyone _They_ wanted dead was best kept alive, she told the group: “I’m going upstairs. Meet me there when you’re ready. The elevator doesn’t work.” And she walked into the front lobby, down the hall, and up the stairs into the dining room.

* * *

 

No one said anything for a really long time after the stranger left and the door slammed shut behind her. Then, once they had all sufficiently caught their breaths, Joe broke the silence with, “I know I’m not Christian, but I don’t think you’re supposed to say ‘fucking’ in a church, Pete.” It was a poor attempt at humor, even he knew, and so he wasn’t the tiniest bit shocked when none of them laughed.

“Do you really think they’re all dead?” Patrick rasped finally. “The crew, the fans—”

“I’m sure most of them got away,” Andy assured him. “Those things didn’t seem to be coming from the crowd, only backstage.”

“What do you think they were?” Joe asked, ducking out of his own guitar. Unlike Patrick, however, he just let it slide to the ground. He wasn’t sure if he’d really need it anymore, anyway.

“They bled blue,” Pete mumbled. “I saw, when she sliced one open.”

“How the fuck did she even get in?” Patrick demanded suddenly. “She was armed to the teeth! What if…what if this is Youngblood Chronicles, coming true? And she’s going to kill all of us?”

“Okay, one, there were no grey-skinned, blue-blooded zombie things in Youngblood Chronicles,” Andy reminded him sensibly. “Two, she was dressed pretty practically and isn’t obviously trying to kill anyone.”

“Except the grey-skinned, blue-blooded zombie things,” Pete cut in.

“Except them,” Andy agreed. “And three, no briefcase.”

“So…a whole new horror story?” Patrick guessed. The other three nodded.

“Looks like,” Pete agreed.

“Well, only way to find out what this whole new horror story is would be to go upstairs and ask her,” Joe said, hauling himself up to his feet—and stumbling, as his legs turned to putty. “And Pete, try not to get us thrown out into the streets. _Please_.”

As the four of them staggered out of the sanctuary and into the lobby, they realized that they didn’t actually know where they were going. The elevator stood directly in front of them, shiny silver doors taunting them. But then Andy pointed to a trail of dark blue-muddy footprints—clearly, the girl had stepped in some of the blue blood earlier and was still trailing it, along with mud from outside. They followed them up a couple short steps and down an impressive sized hallway, their own footfalls echoing loudly—except Andy’s, since he was still barefoot. Once they got to the end of the hall, they saw the stairs.

“I was hoping for like, six steps or something,” Patrick moaned. “There has to be water somewhere else, right?”

“Water, yes,” Pete agreed. “Answers…Not so much, no.”

After what felt like an eternity, they made it up the stairs and into a large, empty room, with a massive floor-to-ceiling window overlooking an empty parking lot. The girl was standing in front of that window, but the band didn’t notice at first, opting instead for the bottles of water she’d laid out for them on the nearest table.

“I see you all decided to trust me for just a little while longer,” she said finally, still looking out the window. “I’ll admit, I’m surprised.” She turned and leaned back against the window. “But I’m glad.” She’d taken off her leather jacket, so she was wearing a dingy tank top that must have been white when it was new, tucked into her black skinny jeans, which were ripped to a point that could no longer be called tasteful. She’d taken off her heavy black boots, leaving blistered bare feet pressed against the tile.

“Why?” Patrick asked, not trusting Pete not to fuck this up again. “Why are you surprised? Why are you glad?”

She shrugged. “I wouldn’t have trusted me,” she admitted. “And as for why…well, let’s just say there’s an apocalypse going.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> And I'm back! This time, who knows what the relationship will be or even if there will be one? And the OFC isn't exactly relatable, but eh. It's fun as hell.
> 
> I know that the chapters in the beginning are shorter than you may be used to if you're coming from All You Sinners Stand Up, but to be fair, I started this AGES ago. There's basically just a jump in chapter size around chapter five, because it got away from me. Also, if you read All You Sinners as I posted, you may recall weekly updates. Sorry. Every other week for this one, since it takes a bit longer for me to write this one than that one did. Good news: it's gonna be way longer. 
> 
> Give this story the treatment you think it deserves, and drop a comment to let me know how I'm doing :)
> 
> Follow me on tumblr at "pyromanicschizophrenic" (same as on here) for updates!


	2. 20 Dollar Nosebleed

Four blank stares followed her words. Perhaps she shouldn’t have been so matter of fact about it. Maybe she should’ve asked the drummer for a drumroll (in truly bad taste). She probably should have said it in a tone of voice that warranted such doom-and-gloom proclamation. Not in a tone that suggested she was merely discussing the weather. “On today’s forecast, hellfire and brimstone. Now to Jim, with sports.” But she’d already dropped the bombshell, so now she just had to wait for them to catch up and start asking questions.

“The…apocalypse,” the crazy-haired one repeated dully. “So…Those things that attacked us…They were actually zombies?”

She shrugged. “Hell if I know. We call them Pawns, that’s all they seem to be. I don’t think they’re zombies, personally, since I don’t think zombies bleed blue when you gut ‘em, but they could be reanimated corpses. I’ve learned to keep my mind open.” She pushed herself off from the window and grabbed a chair, freezing as she caught sight of the drummer’s feet. “Dude, you should probably do something about that.”

He looked down and blinked at his bloody toes. He wiggled them. “Yeah, that stings.”

The bassist—Pete, she remembered—scoffed. “Andy, how did you manage not to catch that?”

“Adrenaline,” she answered for him. “Glad it did something, since it sure as hell didn’t make you run any faster.” She walked over to the window that separated the dining room from the kitchen and hopped over the counter. “Now all four of you sit before you hurt yourselves. I didn’t save your pathetic asses so you could keel over in my safe house.”

“This is a church!” the guitarist supplied.

She rolled her eyes as she soaked a rag and hopped back over the counter, handing the rag to the drummer. “Same difference,” she mumbled, not even bothering to care who heard. She sat in the chair she’d grabbed and faced the band. “Now, I’m sure you noticed, but sorry to say I’m not a fan and I need to know your names.”

They introduced themselves, then stared at her expectantly.

“You’re gonna need to ask questions,” she prompted. “I don’t know how to just explain things.”

“Are you going to tell us _your_ name?” Patrick asked hesitantly. “Because right now you’re just the crazy chick that saved us from probably-not-zombies.”

She smirked. “My friend calls me Zelda. Says I remind him of the princess. Called me that for so long I don’t remember who I used to be.” She leaned back in her chair. “Y’all still got questions, right?”

The four of them exchanged glances before Pete cleared his throat. “So…the apocalypse. That’s a thing?”

Zelda scoffed. “What, you think the world’s just gonna keep on turning forever? No. Eventually, it’s gonna end. Happened to the dinosaurs, happened in the Old Testament, and it’s happening now.” She crossed her legs and pulled a knife…from her ass? “Back pocket,” she explained, reaching over and grabbing a whet stone out of her leather jacket. “Keep asking questions, guys. I’ve never had to explain this before.” She watched them carefully as she sharpened her knife.

“So…if it’s not the _zombie_ apocalypse…” Andy started. “What is it?”

Zelda bit the inside of her cheek in thought. “We don’t know,” she admitted finally. “Benvolio keeps saying Judeo-Christian, but I’ve only come across the Pawns and more than my fair share of Brawlers, and neither of them seem like demons or the devil.” The guys blinked at her, and she sighed. “Pawns are the things that attacked you. They’re basically cannon fodder, and they’re not good for much other than following orders. That’s why they were sent for you. Brawlers are bigger, ‘bout six and half, seven feet tall. Wide, and they’re fucking strong. If you don’t know how to throw knives and you don’t have a gun or something, run. They ain’t fast, you can get away, but you won’t be able to if you try and fight. They’re sent in when whoever’s throwin’ orders around wants people _dead_.”

“Then that means…” Patrick trailed off.

“Why us?” Pete demanded. “Why the _fuck_ are _we_ a target?”

This time, the pause was so long the four of them thought she just wasn’t going to answer. The only sound was the sound of the sharpening knife, which was growing increasingly unsettling as time passed. Pete’s eyes narrowed.

“No, no. You don’t get to drag us all the way here and not tell us—” He froze as he found the newly-very-sharpened knife directly under his chin. He swallowed thickly, feeling the knife catch at his throat. He hadn’t even seen Zelda stand.

“I said it in the sanctuary, and I’ll say it again,” she hissed in his face. “If it was up to me, you would be out on the street _now_. I did not _drag_ anyone _anywhere_.”

She minutely lowered the knife so Pete could answer. He wondered briefly if she’d done this before. “Then why _bother_ with us?”

“I’m just keeping you away from _them_ ,” she snapped, breaking the skin under his chin before withdrawing it and turning her back, stalking towards the window. “I don’t know what they want you for,” she said finally, tucking the knife back into her pocket. “All I know is that they _do_. And I was the closest to where we knew they’d make their move, so I was told to get you away from them.”

“You uhh…” Patrick paused. “You don’t seem like the type to take orders.”

She smirked, even though they couldn’t see. “’M not,” she agreed. “But think. They want you, you’re important. And if you’re important to them, then we need you. If not on our side, then away from theirs.” She turned, leaned against the window.

“But why _us_?” Joe asked finally. “What do they want with _us_?”

“I don’t know,” Zelda whispered. For the first time, she actually sounded like she had a soul. “All we’ve got are theories, and those are all half-baked at best, formed around shit movies and we honestly _don’t know_ anything and it was easy when this was about surviving but now it’s about…about saving the _world_ or something and apparently we’ve got to rely on _you_ for that.” Her voice turned scornful at the end, all traces of a heart gone.

Oh, the looks of shock were even greater than they were when she told them about the apocalypse in the first place.

* * *

 

Pete tried to sleep that night. Really, he did. And he didn’t think he could really be blamed for not being able to sleep when he had only found out a couple hours before that the world was ending. And he didn’t even have a pillow or anything.

“At least pretend to try and sleep,” Patrick mumbled, as Pete sat up and wrapped his arms around his knees.

“You know that never works, ‘Trick,” he whispered back. He stared out the window and watched the lights flicker and change. He was pretty sure there was a fire or two somewhere out there. “Is it just me, or did she make it seem like the world’s been ending for a while now?” he asked after a moment.

“And it managed to escape public notice?” So Hurley wasn’t sleeping either. Pete wasn’t surprised.

He shrugged. “It started with us, guys,” he mumbled. “They attacked us and now the whole world knows it’s ending.” He paused. “Why us, do you think?”

“Because we saved rock and roll,” Joe muttered irritably. “Go the fuck to sleep, Wentz.”

“Just because you can sleep through the apocalypse doesn’t mean the rest of us can,” Andy pointed out.

Joe propped himself up on his elbow. “It’s like you said though,” he snapped back. “You expect me to believe that the world’s been ending and we all just didn’t notice?”

“That’s what happens when you don’t attack the big cities.”

All four men turned their heads to stare at Zelda, who had, apparently, been there the whole time, sitting on the counter separating the dining room from the kitchen.

“You left,” Pete said, after a moment. “You walked out the door.”

Zelda pointed off to the side. “There’s another door into the kitchen,” she offered. “I used that.”

“What do you mean, attacking big cities?” Patrick asked, trying to avoid another argument. He did, in fact, like his bassist, and he didn’t feel like watching this still-strange girl kill him because he was being a mouthy idiot (something he and the other two had long since gotten used to).

Zelda laughed shortly, humorlessly. “I meant exactly that. They attacked small cities, ones with a population of just over a hundred or smaller. Made it a quick attack, no time for it to get around to any news broadcaster that could get it out. And if there was a survivor or two, well. Who would believe them?” She hopped off the counter and joined their circle, careful to stay as far from Pete as possible. Clearly, she was trying to avoid confrontation herself.

“And now they’ve attacked D.C.,” Andy noted.

“D.C.’s pretty big,” Zelda added casually. “Hear there’s a lotta politicians in the area.”

“Which brings us back to why they attacked _us_ ,” Pete hissed scathingly. He, apparently, was _not_ afraid of another death threat.

Zelda levelled a glare at him. “Maybe your guitarist is right,” she said condescendingly. “It’s because you saved rock and roll.” It was all too obvious she thought the idea absolutely ridiculous. She stood up. “You should all rest up. We’ll need to go out tomorrow.”

“Into that?” Pete demanded, shooting up and gesturing wildly at the window. As if to emphasize his point, an orange light flickered ominously in the distance, looking suspiciously like flames. “The zombies and the riots and the _end of the world_?”

“Pete, sit the fuck down and stop provoking her,” Patrick ordered tiredly. “You still haven’t washed the blood off your chin from earlier.”

Pete rubbed the still-stinging spot, as if he’d forgotten about it (which he hadn’t, by the way; he wasn’t completely stupid). But he still wasn’t about to back down. If this bitch was going to drag them around everywhere being cryptic as all hell, then he was going to make it as difficult for her as she was for him. “And how far are you going to make us run this time?” he snapped, not looking at Patrick. “You’re _seriously_ not going to give us a day to process?” He didn’t even have time to think before something came flying towards him and hitting him square in the jaw. He looked down to see it was her whetstone from earlier.

“You wanna stay here by yourself, fine,” she snapped. “Just because Pawns and Brawlers can’t enter Church grounds doesn’t mean their superiors can’t. I’ve never run into any of them, but now I’ve got you four, and you four are fucking _important_ for some fucking reason, so I know I’m going to at some point. Probably sooner rather than later. But I’m going out because we need more food. I’ve got enough to feed _me_ , not me and four full-grown men. So stay here and risk getting caught, captured, or killed, or come with me and at least _pretend_ to make yourself useful.” She didn’t wait for him to respond before she turned on her heel and walked away, this time not stepping directly into the kitchen.

“I’ve got a feeling these Pawns and Brawlers are gonna be the least of your concern if you don’t learn to keep your mouth shut, Wentz,” Joe remarked dryly, laying back down and closing his eyes.

 

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> God damn it, Pete.
> 
> Follow me on Tumblr! My username is "pyromanicschizophrenic" and I post about the status of this story, other stories (eventually), and cute puppy pictures I get from Tyler Oakley and Thomas Sanders.


	3. Grenade Jumper

“First thing’s first, do not look like you’re in any way panicking.” Zelda’s voice was different. It was completely calm, no signs of the open hostility she’d shown yesterday. It was probably due to the fact that Pete, in a surprising show of self-preservation, had stayed silent thus far. “Don’t attract attention. Hide in plain sight. Two, stay close. I’m not giving any of you knives until you prove to me that you know what you’re doing with them, and we haven’t got time to do that now. And, finally, make sure he stays quiet.” She nodded pointedly at Pete before turning, freezing immediately as someone knocked on the door.

“Please tell me you ordered pizza,” Pete begged, completely disregarding her last request (demand).

She didn’t answer, she only shushed him, stepping lightly forward and drawing her katana and holding it steady. “If I told you to hide, would you?” she hissed, not pausing as she edged toward the door. None of them answered, but she did hear a scuttling that probably meant they were moving out of sight of the doorway. She reached the door, took a steady breath, and threw it open, holding the sword across the entryway.

“Oh shit please don’t kill us we didn’t do anything I swear!”

“ _Brendon_?” Patrick asked, stepping forward and staring at the newcomers in shock. “Dallon?”

Zelda didn’t lower the sword from where it sat, rather lifting it so that it rested at their throats.

“Patrick!” the shorter one exclaimed. He yelped when Zelda pressed the blade a little more, feeling the sting on his throat. “No please I swear I’m not a spy or something _please_.”

“State your names, business, and how you found this place,” she growled dangerously. Patrick backed up at the almost feral glare she was giving to half of Panic!.

“Brendon Urie and Dallon Weekes,” the taller one answered in a tone of obviously forced calm, when it became clear that the shorter one wasn’t about to answer. “We need somewhere to stay, Pete texted us last night and—”

Zelda had crossed the room before he finished. In a matter of seconds, she had Pete pressed against the wall, a hunting knife pressed against his throat. Pete tried to ignore the beads of red he could feel welling up.

“You don’t _learn_ , do you?” she hissed, hitting his shoulder with the heel of her palm. “My patience with you was thin to begin with, and it’s fraying fast. I don’t know what to do with _four_ of you, so you give me two more? I was being kind when I brought _you_ here. This is _my_ safe house, my protection. And I chose to share it. With _you_. With four _useless_ musicians from Chicago that the Pawns were sent to capture. I don’t know who _they_ —” She pointed to Brendon and Dallon, still standing in the doorway despite nothing keeping them there, “—are, where they’re from, or who they work for. And sure, maybe you thought you were being courteous, but the courtesy was not _yours_ to extend.” She backed away, re-sheathing the knife. “Next time, you’ll have more than a thin line of blood,” she added. “You are on _very_ thin ice, Wentz. Tread carefully.” She turned back to Brendon and Dallon, and sighed.

“If it helps,” Brendon piped up, voice still a little high with fear. “We work for Pete.”

“No,” Zelda hissed. “No, that does not help.” She stalked back towards the door, picking up her discarded katana. “Either follow me or risk capture,” she called, not turning or slowing as she pushed herself between the newcomers. “Makes no difference to me anymore.”

“Pete,” Patrick said slowly, as they started following down the stairs. “ _I’m_ about to kill you.”

* * *

“Well, based on your description and everything Zelda said last night, sounds like they were something called Brawlers,” Andy explained to Brendon and Dallon, treading carefully to avoid broken glass.

“But what the fuck does that even _mean_?” Brendon demanded. Lamented? Demanded lamentfully? And loudly.

Dallon shushed him, shooting a worried glance up at Zelda. He didn’t think speaking loudly would get them on her good side. Which, seeing how she treated Pete, who was most certainly not on her good side, was exactly where they wanted to be. “I think we’d all prefer to not have her turn one of her many, many blades on us,” he explained, when Brendon glared at him questioningly.

“Except Pete, who’s managed it twice in less than eight hours,” Joe supplied helpfully. Pete hit him. “Hey, don’t punish me because _you’ve_ got a death wish,” he whined. “Unlike you, I don’t get off on pain.”

“I’m not _getting_ _off_ ,” Pete countered. “I’ve got Meagan for—”

All at once, five of the six musicians froze as they realized the same thing. Zelda stopped once she heard their footsteps stop and started laughing mirthlessly.

“And it hits them.” She turned around and walked back to them. “I can see that you’ve come to realize the full ramifications of the apocalypse,” she assured them. “And I understand that those full ramifications are truly terrible. However, I would like to remind you to keep walking, and you may all have your mental-slash-emotional breakdowns when we get back to the church.”

“No, we’re not going to wait to _worry_ about our _families_ until it fits _your_ schedule.” Surprisingly, it was Patrick who snapped, not Pete. “I don’t know what the fuck happened to turn you into some cold, unfeeling _shell_ of a person. But in case you hadn’t noticed, it _hasn’t happened to us yet_. So we will _panic_ , and _worry_ , about our kids, and our wives, and even our fucking _dogs_ —” Brendon nodded in acknowledgement that Patrick had included him “—because we are still _human_ , and humans _worry_ about that kind of shit.”

Zelda blinked at him, then leaned against the wall. “You done?” she asked, bored.

Patrick nodded, chest heaving.

“Good.” She straightened up. “I didn’t say you couldn’t worry about them. I said don’t break down because of it. In case you’ve forgotten, you’re _wanted_ by the Big Guy in charge. And here we are, in the open, where the Pawns and Brawlers aren’t even the biggest concern we have. It’s the people that are panicking.” She stepped forward as a rock flew directly through where her head had been, cracking a window. “I’m sorry that you have wives, and kids. I’m sorry that you’re stuck with me.” She turned to Brendon and Dallon, acknowledging them for the first time since they’d shown up at the church. “And I’m sorry you two had to watch your friends get killed by the Brawlers. But right now, right here, we are sitting ducks.” She turned back to Patrick. “All I ask is that you save the debilitating freakout for when that is no longer true. Because I don’t want to die for you.” She turned without waiting for answer and started walking again, tensing when Pete finally spoke up.

“So I get fed up with you, I get threatened to get my throat slit, but Patrick gets fed up, and you fucking _apologize for the inconvenience_?” he snapped. “You wanna tell me how the fuck that makes sense?” She took a deep breath and started walking again. “No,” he hissed, darting forward and grabbing her arm. “No, you’re going to _answer me_.”

“You do not give orders,” she told him in a forced calm. “You do not make demands. You are lucky we are not in the church right now. I warned you, earlier, that you are on thin ice. That ice is cracking. If you do not let go of me _right now_ , it will break.”

Surprisingly, Pete listened, and let go.

“Wise choice.” She stepped off again, and the others followed.

“Pete,” Brendon said quietly as they walked. “Pete, I already lost two of my friends to this shitfest. Please don’t make me lose a third.”

* * *

The rest of the trip to the store was relatively uneventful. Discounting the fact that the only reason Patrick wasn’t hit with something suspiciously resembling a Molotov cocktail was that he was extremely short. But Pete had managed to not put himself in even worse terms with Zelda, and no one had actively been attacked, so everyone could count it as a win.

So, naturally, it stood to reason that the return trip would be the exact opposite. They got to the store, grabbed what they could—Pete actually had a good idea for once, using the plastic bags that were just sitting there—and walked out of the store…

And found themselves faced with five thick-bodied, grey-skinned, bulky creatures. They didn’t seem to notice them at first, their backs were turned. Zelda slowly and quietly removed some small, thin knives from one of her jacket pockets. “We’re going to very slowly get the hell away from here,” she whispered, barely audible. “Edge along the wall, up to the stairs. Do not turn your backs until you can’t see them anymore. If they see us, _run_.”

No one moved, despite her instructions. Zelda only just resisted the urge to shut her eyes, and only because doing so would require taking them off the Brawlers. She reached out and nudged the shoulder nearest her—she wasn’t looking, but she was pretty sure it was Andy, since he still wasn’t wearing a shirt. He stumbled lightly before edging away, waking something in the others. They made it as far as the stairs before the first Brawler noticed them.

Zelda didn’t bother sparing them a look, just hoped that the sounds of their heavy footfalls meant they had, in fact, listened to her. Briefly lamenting the loss, she threw her first knife as she backed up the stairs. She cursed as it bounced off its shoulder, leaving nothing more than a nick that showed its blue blood underneath. Reaching the top of the stairs, she threw her next one, then turned and ran when it embedded in its eye. They would (hopefully) take too long to get up, and she’d already be back at base.

She caught up with the guys about a block from the church, rolling her eyes at their heavy breathing. “Alright, training starts tomorrow.” She shoved Brendon forward. “We aren't safe yet,” she added, noting that everyone had slowed down considerably. They sped up, appearing to take solace in the fact that they were almost there. Zelda glanced back and avoided cursing out loud—she could see the four remaining Brawlers in the distance. She didn’t think it would help the idiot brigade, and she knew for a fact that they couldn’t set foot on Holy Ground, for some reason. It was the main reason Benvolio believed Judeo-Christian Apocalypse.

They made it into the sanctuary and collapsed, not even making it to a pew this time—Zelda was impressed, since they only ran about a quarter the distance. Maybe it was the full impact of what was at stake if they didn’t run fast enough? Or the weight of the bags of food they were carrying. She made a note to ask when they’d calmed down.

“Well, I will admit that I’m impressed that you didn’t drop your bags in panic,” she told them all dryly. “I have some thinking to do, do not follow me if you do not wish to be on worse terms with me than _him_ ,” she commanded, pointing at Pete. “And if you follow, you won’t make it two steps before you fall to the ground with a knife in your eye.”

“She’s really charming, isn’t she?” Brendon muttered, slipping further down the wall.

“Pete started off yelling at her,” Joe explained, since Patrick was still panting too hard to speak. “And he’s been yelling at her since.”

“Traitor,” Pete hissed. He stared thoughtfully at the door. “Think she meant it when she said—”

“Pete, I swear to God,” Patrick wheezed, “if you even _think_ the ending to that question, I will kill you myself. And we’re in a sanctuary, so I _have_ to keep my word or I’ll get smote.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> If there's anyone considering studying at George Mason University, don't. The Wi-Fi's shit and the dorms are terrible and it's not worth what you're paying. That is all.
> 
> I know there are some plot holes in this. I'm sorry. Fill them at your leisure.


	4. Headfirst Slide Into Cooperstown on a Bad Bet

“It just…I don’t get where we come in,” Brendon said, for the hundredth time or so.

“Then ask Zelda!” Pete snapped finally. “She has all the answers, doesn’t she? She knows about the Pawns, and the Brawlers, and how to throw fucking _knives_ and she’s just fucking _brilliant_ at everything, isn’t she?” He jumped to his feet. “’Course, not like she’s going to _tell_ anyone _anything,_ is she? Never fucking does, no. Just tells you what to do, tells you that she’s right, and just _expects_ you to fucking _believe_  her. No proof, no evidence, no _anything._ Just…’I’m right, trust me.’ And you guys!” he added, rounding on his bandmates. “I’m like, the _only one_ here that questions her? The only one that thinks, ‘hey, these things tried to kill us, and she shows up, that seems vaguely suspicious.’ Why should I trust her? Why the fuck do you?” He stopped, breathing heavily after his rant.

Patrick looked up at him warily. “Are you finished?”

“Am I _finished?”_ he repeated. “You even _sound_  like her, do you _hear_ yourself?”

“Pete, enough,” Andy commanded finally. He stood up and put a hand on the bassist’s shoulder. “Look, I don’t trust her either. I think it’s fair to say that none of us do. But Pete, she saved us. Twice, now. So maybe she’s not a hero, maybe she’s not the good guy here, but she’s certainly not the bad one. I don’t trust her as a person, but I trust that she can get. Us. Through this. And at the very least, we need you to do that too. Because if she’s right, and we’re the ones destined to save the world, we can’t have you keep pissing her off until she kills you. Because we’re going to need you. Okay?”

Pete deflated, then collapsed into a chair conveniently placed behind him (he later found out Joe put it there). “I just…She’s getting under my skin, and if I had any chance at winning a fight with her, I’d fight back. Hell, _I’d_ attack first, it’s just…”

“Well, you don’t have a chance at winning a fight, so stop picking them,” Patrick reminded him helpfully. “And apologize, because you’ve been a complete and total jackass.”

Pete snorted. “Yeah, if she ever comes back up.”

* * *

The next morning, Pete was surprised to find that Zelda had either been gone the entire night, or had been in and out while he’d been asleep. Which was great, except if he didn’t get the chance to apologize in the next ten or so minutes, he’d chicken out and…not do that. Because he was a coward, and she scared him.

While he was lost in thought, the door opened, and in stepped the girl he was thinking about. She tensed as she saw him staring at her. “Hey, Pete,” she said stiffly.

“We, uhm…” He swallowed thickly. “Look, I need to…I need to say—Nothing, all that important, I swear,” he amended, seeing her draw a butterfly knife from her boot.

“Just…One minute, alright?” She sounded tired, which was unsurprising. She looked like she hadn’t slept at all. She set the knife on the table, then shucked off her jacket and took off her boots. Pete watched her start taking knives out of all their holsters, actually shocked at how many she had. “Alright, over here,” she said finally, gesturing over to the other side of the room. She sat down against the wall and looked up at him. “Get it all out,” she prompted.

Pete blinked. That had not been what he was expecting _at all._ “I…What?”

Zelda sighed. It sounded more tired, resigned, than it had the past couple days. “Look, I’ve been a bitch. And y’all don’t deserve that. You got thrown into the deep end of this shit just the same as I did. And there’s more pressure on you then there was on me. Almost killing you because you’re freaking out…” She shook her head. “So all your problems. Yell at me. Go for it. My knives are over there, and it’s too much effort to kill you with my bare hands, especially this early in the morning.”

Pete gaped at her. “Well, _I_  was going to apologize, because I certainly could have handled it better, but—”

“Don’t,” Zelda interrupted. “Pete, in the past two days, you have discovered the world’s ending, run for your life _twice_ , become essentially homeless, and you don’t know how your family’s faring through this _at all._ And I’m here, acting like…What did Patrick call me? An unfeeling shell, or something? And he was right.”

“Well…” Pete paused, contemplating his next words as he sat down beside her. “It’s just…I don’t think it would be this bad if you hadn’t just…’Hey, the world’s ending, but I’m on your side, I promise,’ and…”

“I told you I was surprised you’d decided to trust me,” she reminded him. “Because I wouldn’t have. There were these freaky monster zombie things and I showed up and…God, I kidnapped a world famous rock band and the world went to shit.”

“Oh, God, our crew’s gotta be worried about—”

“Pete, I’m sorry, but there’s no way they got away from that,” Zelda cut him off. “You run from Brawlers, you don’t run from Pawns. Pawns are fast, you mow them down. The fans, the kids in the audience, they’ll have escaped. Anyone backstage…” She looked down at her hands. “There’s just no way.”

Pete looked out at the five sleeping forms spread around the dining room floor. “So all this time, we’ve been talking about my side. How I’m experiencing this. What’s yours?”

“Mine’s irrelevant.”

“Bullshit,” Pete snapped. “We’re stuck with each other until the apocalypse gets taken care of, or whatever. You get my side, help me see yours. We won’t be at each other’s throats as much, and I won’t be coming off as suicidal.”

Zelda stared at her hands. “It’s…I guess I’ve just forgotten how to interact with other people?”

“Zelda, how long have you been here alone?”

She shrugged. “Hell if I know. Didn’t know the date when I got here, don’t know the date now. I talk to other people around the world. People who know what’s going on. And now I’ve got six people who are fucking terrified and worried about their families and what the _fuck_ am I supposed to do with that?”

“I’m really sorry about B and Dal, by the way,” Pete said finally. “It’s just…I’ve known Bren since he was a kid, and he called me up panicking and I couldn’t understand them but I caught that Kenny and Dan were dead, and I just…”

“You felt responsible,” Zelda supplied. “Alright. Look at it this way.” She shifted so she was facing him full on. “This is my safe house. And it’s been mine, basically since I became a Survivor. And I’m sharing it, with four men in their thirties. But it’s okay, because _I_  brought you here. But these two total strangers show up, I’ve never seen them, never heard of them, and have no idea where they came from or _anything._ They could have been spies or something. Because, Pete, that does happen. Humans working for whoever’s pulling the strings behind all this. Pete, I’m paranoid, and you bring these two total strangers to my doorstep.”

“So you’d have said yes, if I’d asked you straight up?” Pete didn’t believe it, and Zelda could tell.

“If you’d gotten  _Andy_ to ask me,” Zelda corrected. “Because I fucking hated you—still kinda do—and I’d have said no just to spite you. And I’m glad that didn’t happen, because the tall one is my favorite so far.”

“Thanks,” Pete said blankly.

She smiled wryly. “He’s not annoying.” She leaned her head against the wall. “And he hasn’t tried talking back to me yet.”

“Yeah, well, he’s seen where talking back to you will get him,” Pete pointed out.

“So have you,” she reminded him. “And it’s yet to stop you.”

Pete shrugged. “Guess I don’t know how to take a hint.”

* * *

When Patrick woke up, he was genuinely shocked to see Pete still alive. There was some noise coming from the kitchen, Joe and Andy were in the corner talking about something in hushed voices, Brendon and Dallon were each off in their own little worlds, and Pete was seated in front of the window, looking out over the exponentially growing disaster on the streets. He stood up and headed over to sit next to his best friend.

“Either apologizing went well or you chickened out,” Patrick observed, gently nudging the bassist’s shoulder.

“She’s looking for coffee,” Pete said absently. “I’ve never had coffee in a church before.”

“Probably won’t be any better than the coffee we get in hotels,” Patrick pointed out. “Don’t get too excited.” He knew this game. Pete would avoid the subject for as long as possible until he ran out of things to avoid it with, at which point he’d explain exactly what happened.

“This church used to have a food ministry, back when it was still in use.” Patrick wondered for a moment why the church stopped being used, why the people stopped going. Nobody knew about the apocalypse three days ago, so there’s really no good reason for the church to have been disbanded. “They would drive around the city, handing out food and coffee to the homeless people on the streets.”

“Homeless people church coffee, is what you’re saying.”

Pete laughed, but it was hollow, humorless. Patrick didn’t really view it as a victory.

“Why’s she looking for coffee, anyway?”

Pete shrugged. “Said we were no good to her if we were all suffering from migraines brought about by not having any caffeine.”

Patrick couldn’t fault that logic, since his head was already pounding and he’d only been awake five minutes. He wasn’t sure if that was just because of the lack of caffeine, or if it had something to do with all the running he’d done the past two days and worrying about Elisa and Declan and Pete—because much as he loved his best friend, his self-preservation instincts could clearly use a lot of work—and the stress of finding out that the world was ending and it was up to him and his bandmates to stop it. Either way, caffeine would certainly help.

“Guess we should have thought to pick up some coffee while we were out yesterday, huh?”

“There’s no water for it anyway,” Pete said mournfully. “The tap’ll be terrible and she won’t use the bottled water for coffee.”

“She might,” Patrick argued. “She has to know that the tap won’t be good anymore. She wouldn’t be looking for any coffee if she wasn’t willing to sacrifice some of the bottled water.”

Pete didn’t answer. Maybe they were coming too close to the subject he was so carefully avoiding.

“She’s sorry,” he said finally, barely above a whisper.

Patrick’s brow furrowed. Wasn’t _Pete_ supposed to be the one to apologize? “What?”

“She said…She’s been all alone. All alone, stuck here. She’s had time to get used to everything, let herself distance herself from it, let herself go cold. She said she’s sorry that she forgot that we aren’t the same.” Pete stared out at the skyline, as if it were telling him something important. “Do you think that’s going to happen to us?”

“Pete, that’s—”

“Don’t just tell me what you think I want to hear,” the bleached blond interrupted. “Tell me what you think.”

Patrick wanted to say no. That they’d never see a huge city collapse and think _oh look, they’ve become self-aware_ , or to see people panicking and think that they were being ridiculous. He wanted to assure his best friend that they’d always be empathetic, they’d always remember how it felt to find out about the world ending and so they’d let any newcomers panic and be afraid. But then he listened back to the kitchen, heard the rummaging stop and the soft sound of bare feet landing lightly on the tiled floor. Remembered the way that she’d told them all to save the freakout over their families until they were safe.

“If you start becoming like that,” Patrick said finally, “then I will smack you so fucking hard, Pete. You’re not going to stop caring. I won’t let you.”

“It’s probably harder,” Zelda added, coming up and sitting down on Patrick’s other side. “To dissociate, when you have friends around. Or at least, it takes longer.” Patrick had seen it before, in her eyes, the cold distance with which she handled everything. It had been terrifying and infuriating, but suddenly, in that moment, it was nothing less than sad. Zelda must have lost everything, to have gotten where she was with them, just as they had all lost everything.

Except that they still had each other. Patrick had Pete, Joe, Andy, Brendon, and Dallon. The six of them were friends already, and they weren’t losing each other any time soon. How many friends had Zelda lost to this? Did she have siblings? Her parents? A boyfriend, or a girlfriend? It hurt him, to look at her and see what she’d become, to remember that she must have been something else at some point.

“Do not waste time feeling sorry for me,” Zelda said softly, breaking Patrick out of his train of thought. “It won’t do any of us any good.” She stood up and turned to face the room as a whole. “I said yesterday that we would begin training. I intend to keep that promise.”

“Training for…what, exactly?” Joe asked from his corner.

“Survival,” Zelda answered, pointing to Brendon and Dallon. “And just general saving the world things.” She pointed at the other four. “Get up, get moving.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> *CUE ROCKY THEME FOR THE TRAINING MONTAGE*
> 
> Aw, maybe Pete won't get himself killed now.  
> (He probably will but maybe. Patrick can dream.)
> 
> Also, I'm aware this is a day late. I'm gonna try not to do that again.
> 
> Follow me on Tumblr, I'm pyromanicschizophrenic there too.


	5. A Little Less Sixteen Candles...

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The first half of the training montage you didn't know you needed.

“If one of us keels over, do you think she’ll give us a water break?” Dallon wheezed, bracing his hand on the wall to keep himself from staggering into it.

“I nominate Pete to test that theory,” Brendon piped up, not bothering to stop himself from stumbling headlong into the metal door.

“Fuck you,” Pete responded from back near the bottom of the stairs. Dallon and Andy seemed to be in the best shape after running up and down two flights of stairs for…however long they’d been going. Dallon because of his monstrously long legs, and Andy because the fucker did CrossFit. Pete’s legs felt like lead, Patrick looked like he could barely breathe, and Joe and Brendon were clearly starting to really feel the repercussions of smoking. “We may have come to an agreement, but I’m pretty sure she still hates me,” he added, starting up the stairs again. “If I keel over she’ll probably just laugh and say ‘good riddance.’”

“Yeah, but we’re destined to save the world,” Joe reminded him, before breaking down into another hacking coughing fit. “That…you…too.”

“Where…Where’s Andy?” Patrick asked finally, effectively stopping the discussion of who should sacrifice themselves to the fate of falling down the stairs for the sake of water.

Dallon glanced up towards the door into the big room and shrugged. “I think…he went…up there.”

“Almost done!” Brendon cheered, starting up the stairs with new vigor. He only made it up the first three steps before his knees buckled, and he had to clutch the rail to stay upright.“Or—” He broke down into his own coughing fit, slowly starting to walk up the stairs. Dallon followed, taking two at a time with ease.

“I wanna be tall,” Patrick whined, matching Pete’s pace as they made their way up. Joe was leaning against the wall, brushing his hair out of his face.

“I just wanna be done,” he countered, trying to catch his breath and not start coughing again. He started up with Pete and Patrick, on what must have been the last stretch, because Dallon and Brendon had disappeared back into the main room too.

As soon as they reached the top, the kitchen door opened to reveal Zelda holding out three bottles of water. “I don’t assume you three counted how many times you went up and down?”

“Is a fuckload an accurate number?” Pete rasped.

“No.” Zelda brushed past them and opened the door into the other room, revealing Andy, Dallon, and Brendon lying on the ground, breathing heavy with empty water bottles next to them. She turned to Patrick. “You have asthma, don’t you?”

He nodded, collapsing onto the ground and draining his water bottle. “Should…I…told you?”

“It would have been wise, yes,” she agreed. “We raided a drugstore, yesterday. Did you think to grab an inhaler while we were there?”

Patrick’s groan of frustration was answer enough.

“Nothing for it now,” she sighed, seeming just as frustrated herself. “As for the two of you,” she pointed to Joe and Brendon. “Please tell me neither of you are active smokers.”

“I vape?” Brendon offered.

“Not since…Not for a while,” Joe answered.

Pete looked up at the ceiling, willing himself not to start crying. He knew what Joe had been about to say, and he didn’t really want to think about that right now.

“That’s better than it could be, I suppose. Your lungs will clear out eventually.” She pointed to Andy. “You’re my new favorite.”

“I feel like we’re all going to just cycle through as favorites,” Joe joked weakly, coughing again.

“Except Pete,” Patrick added. He looked mournfully at the empty bottle in his hand. “Is there…?”

“Catch your breath, stretch out. You’re no good to anyone cramped up.” Zelda stood up moved into the kitchen.

* * *

“Whatever we’re going to do down there, can’t we do up _here_?” Yes, Brendon was whining, but _damn it_  he didn’t want to deal with the stairs again. Ever again.

“There’s a carpet downstairs,” Zelda replied, with the sort of finality that said that answered everything. “It may not seem like much now, but you’ll be grateful for it in an hour, I assure you.”

“What the _fuck_  is that supposed to mean?” Pete demanded, flailing his arms spastically. “’There’s a carpet downstairs, you’ll be grateful for it.’ Do you actually _hear_  yourself when you speak, or do you just say words and hope it makes sense?”

“We are going downstairs,” Zelda repeated, her voice dropping dangerously. “And if you do not know why, then you will very shortly. I apologize for thinking it was obvious. Clearly I was wrong.” She took off down the stairs, not sparing a glance back at them.

“What happens if we stay up here?” Brendon called down to her, more out of curiosity than Pete’s still-apparent death wish.

“Then you will die,” she called back, disappearing around the corner and down the other flight of steps.

“She’s getting to be like the Boy Who Cried Wolf with the death thing,” Dallon observed, looking vaguely sick at the prospect of the stairs.

“We should probably still go down, though,” Patrick said resignedly. “So let’s just get it over with.”

“Fine,” Pete grumbled. “But I’m staying down there.”

There was a general noise of assent from the other five as they all headed down the stairs, probably going much slower than Zelda would have liked. Brendon couldn’t help but feel a stab of pride at that.

Something about the girl seemed so terribly off to him, and it wasn’t just the way that she had held a sword to his throat when he first got to the church. Pete had been right the night before; the way that she seemed to just bank on them all trusting her, or at the least believing her. And there was something in the way that she somehow looked like she was seeing everything in the room all at once, as if Brendon could flip her off behind her back and she’d know in an instant and throw one of her fancy throwing knives at his throat.

“How you holding up?” Dallon asked quietly, as they fell to the back of the group.

“Someone has to tell Victoria,” Brendon mumbled bleakly. “Dean doesn’t have a father, I…”

“Don’t,” Dallon commanded gently. “Don’t think about that. Not about any of that.”

Brendon looked up at him mournfully. “I’ve _tried_  that, Dal. I’ve been trying so fucking hard, to just ignore all of that, and—”

“Don’t think about elephants.” Brendon’s head shot up to look at Zelda, standing by the rail.

“I…what?” he asked intelligently.

“Elephants,” she repeated. “Don’t think about them. Especially pink elephants. They’re in the fridge upstairs, I should show them to you sometime.” She turned around and opened the door at the end.

“Did…Did she just make a _joke_?” Joe asked, staring at the door in shock.

“Hey!” she called harshly. “You may not realize it, but we’re kind of pressed for time here. Hurry the fuck up!”

“No,” Pete said darkly. “You must have imagined it.”

They all went into the room together, and the light clicked for them all.

“No, no, I—I’m not—” Patrick stammered, trying to back out. Zelda grabbed him by the shoulder and shoved him forward.

“You are all going to learn to fight,” she said firmly. “We don’t know what exactly it is that’s outside this city; we don’t even know all of what’s _in_  this city. So you are going to learn to fight hand to hand, then we are going to go looting and find you all weapons. And then you are going to learn how to use those. Any questions?”

“So who’s fighting who?” Andy asked. He seemed like the only one that was still up for any amount of training after the hell that was running up and down the stairs for an hour.

“You’re all fighting me.” She spread her arms wide and grinned broadly. It didn’t reach her eyes. “Who wants to go first?”

Pete shifted tensely. It wasn’t a secret to anybody in the room that he’d been itching to punch Zelda since she’d brought them to the church, even after they had apparently made some sort of peace. But Brendon could see the catch from a mile away; even with her arms spread apart as they were, she’d take down whoever rushed her before they even threw the first strike.

“Look, either one of you hits me first, or I hit one of you at random,” she said after a moment of nervous shifting and shuffling. “Frankly, I like the second option more, but the first one will make this training thing easier on all of us.”

Something in the easy way she said it in made Brendon’s blood boil. And just like that, something in him snapped; the way that she didn’t seem to care about their families, the way that her condolences the day before had seemed more like empty words then genuine sympathy. He rushed the two steps and swung out at her, barely noticing the ease with which she blocked him. He swung again, clipping her shoulder as she ducked out of the way. Another couple deflected blows, she started punching back. He dodged a few, but most of them hit their mark—a few punches to the gut, a foot to the back of the knee, an elbow to the back, just barely missing his spine. He crumpled to the ground, feeling her foot on the back of his neck.

“If I were to put my weight on my foot, your neck would snap,” she said calmly. “That said, you did much better than I expected.” She lifted her foot and extended a hand. He glared at it before climbing to his feet without her help. “In case you are still wondering, this is more for my benefit than for yours. I’m trying to assess your personal fighting styles, how much raw skill you have. Tomorrow, I’m going to match your raw skill levels and there will be actual sparring.” She turned to where Brendon had sat down in the corner to sulk. “You can go back upstairs, if you want. Or you can stay down here and watch me kick Pete’s ass.”

“What if I wanna go next?” Joe demanded.

Zelda turned to him and raised a brow curiously. “Be my guest. I’m just pointing out that I think all of you are most excited to see me and Pete go at each other in this sort of environment.”

Joe didn’t attack next, just backed up a half step so that he was hovering just behind Andy.

“My earlier threat stands,” she announced after a moment. “I will choose at random.”

* * *

“She enjoyed that way too much,” Patrick moaned, poking at the blossoming bruise on his right side.

Pete glared at him in the mirror. He was in the middle of examining the already dark bruise that took up his entire left cheek. “I fuckin’ _behaved_  today,” he growled. “The fuck is her fucking _problem_?”

“You didn’t have the energy to be difficult today?” Dallon offered, rubbing at his rug-burnt elbow with a pout.

“And she’s still salty about the past two days,” Brendon added.

“Nobody asked you,” Pete snapped. He let out a frustrated scream and punched the wall, then screamed again with more frustration and more than a little bit of pain as an audible _crack_  reverberated through the bathroom. “ _FUCK_!”

Patrick looked at his best friend and closed his eyes, sighing. “Can we get a minute, guys?”

The other four filed out silently, Joe clapping Pete on the back as he passed. Patrick waited a moment after the door closed. Then he sat down on the grimy bathroom floor and stared up at the bassist expectantly. Pete collapsed down next to him, tears gathering in his eyes.

“It’s like…I talk to her. We figure something out. And this morning, she seemed like she was trying, _actually_  trying to remember that we’re fucking _human_. Did you see her in there? She’s colder than she was before. And the world’s ending, ‘Trick. Did you hear what Brendon and Dallon were talking about on the way down? Someone has to tell Kenny’s _wife_  that her husband is _dead_. We just forgot about worrying about our families, Patrick. She told us to wait, and we fucking _listened_  to her. Well I’m not, anymore. I’m going to worry about Bronx and Saint and Meagan because they are my _family_  and I have no idea if they’re even alive and…” Pete stopped when his voice broke, and he just started sobbing. Patrick wrapped his arms around him and held tight.

“I know,” he murmured. “Pete, believe me, I…” He took a breath to keep his own voice from breaking. “There are no words for how scared I am for Elisa and Declan, all right? And you know that, because you know that there are no words for how scared you are for your family. And we are all worried about our families, we are all _scared_  for our families. But Pete, it’s not going to do any good right now. We can’t do this if we’re scared.”

“You really…really think we can do this _anyway_?” Pete pointed out. “We’re just four dudes in a rock band, man. I’m way too old for this shit. You’ve got asthma, Joe’s gonna cough out his lungs before we even get out of DC, we’re all short as fuck. We’re not cut out for this, Patrick. We’re all gonna die. Everyone’s gonna die. What’s the fucking _point_?”

“If I wasn’t so sore, I’d hit you myself,” Patrick threatened. “Look, I know. We’re probably nobody’s first choice for the world’s heroes. We aren’t the Avengers, we aren’t the Justice League. We make music. But we can’t just _give up_. Do you understand me?”

“It’s so much easier, though,” Pete breathed. “We’re safe here, aren’t we? There’s…There’s a basement. There’s a bathroom, look. I like it here. It’s like she said on day one. The world was always going to end. Why can’t we just let it?”

Patrick could feel something cold gripping around his insides. He knew instinctively that Pete was talking nonsense, that he didn’t even believe it himself. But he had such a good point. What _was_  the point?

“Because they might still be alive,” he mumbled, as much for himself as it was for Pete. “Because Meagan is fucking _smart_ , Pete. She’ll have gotten the boys someplace safe. You live in LA, you’ve got shit stocked for a crisis. And sure, maybe the anticipated crisis was an earthquake, but there’s still canned food, bottled water. It’s only been three days, they’re probably _fine_. So the sooner we do this, the sooner we get good enough to fight and fend for ourselves, the sooner we get out of here and _end this_. Then we can get home to our families, and they’ll still be alive, because we did this before they could run out of emergency supplies.”

There was a moment where Pete looked up at him, whiskey eyes shining and rimmed red. “Do you actually believe that?”

“I have to,” Patrick affirmed. “We have to. We all have to.” He nudged Pete’s shoulder. “We should get upstairs. Get your hand fixed.”

The bassist nodded as he climbed to his feet, cradling his injured hand to his chest. “They’ll be okay,” he mumbled, looking down at the floor.

Patrick nodded. “They’ll be okay.”

* * *

Dallon was the first one up the stairs and into the dining room, barely opening the door enough to get through it. He couldn’t imagine the kind of pressure the Fall Out Boy guys must be under, being told that they’re the only ones able to stop the apocalypse. He wouldn’t even have imagined the pressure _he_  was under, and his only concern was to survive long enough to get home and make sure that his family was still alive. He had a good feeling that Zelda’s training was going to let him assure that they stayed that way, once he found them.

“Something on your mind?” Zelda asked casually. Dallon looked over to her, sitting in the corner and sharpening a wicked looking knife. He walked over to her, careful to stay outside her immediate reach with the knife. He knew he didn’t have a chance against her even across the room, especially given how sore he was, but at least by keeping a distance he could see his death coming.

“Thank you,” he mumbled, glancing up as the door opened and Brendon, Andy, and Joe staggered inside. “For distracting him, earlier.”

Zelda hummed, the _shink_  of the whetstone making Dallon slightly uncomfortable. “It doesn’t do to dwell on things that can’t be changed,” she muttered distantly, as if she was thinking of something else entirely. “Especially when there are more immediate concerns.” She didn’t say _relevant_ , or _important_. Dallon realized, then, that they had her all wrong. It wasn’t that she didn’t _care_ , that she didn’t _feel_. It was that she saw things so differently from them that she prioritized her concerns based on how quickly the danger could be expected to appear.

“Is there a reason Pete and Patrick are still downstairs?” Zelda asked suddenly, loud enough that the other three could hear as well.

“Pete’s angry again,” Joe offered. “Patrick’s trying to keep him from doing something stupid when he gets back up here.”

“That seems like a losing battle,” she observed, running the pad of her thumb along her knife. She stood up and tucked it into a sheath on her belt that Dallon hadn’t noticed before. Now that he was looking, there were all kinds of sheaths and holsters that were strategically placed to be unnoticed at first. It was impressive.

“Stupider than usual,” Andy amended, leaning his head against the wall and breathing deeply. “I think he broke his hand.”

“Didn’t you two come to some sort of agreement last night?” Brendon demanded brashly. Dallon held his breath, afraid to see how Zelda would react. “Because you would think that you’d _act_  like it.”

“We did come to an agreement early this morning,” Zelda agreed calmly, shocking everyone in the room. “Which is why you’ll find that the only severe injury Pete has sustained today was self-inflicted.” She crossed the room and moved into the kitchen, ducking out of their view. “When they get back up here, I will update you all on the plan.”

“Oh, there’s a plan now?” Brendon asked scathingly. “Why couldn’t you tell us the plan _yesterday_?”

“Or when we got here?” Joe added, much less hostile than Brendon. Dallon couldn’t tell if it was because he was more tired, or if that was just the kind of person Joe was.

“There was not a plan yesterday,” Zelda said simply, standing back up and placing an army green metal box up on the counter. “And certainly not one the day you four arrived.” She hopped back over the counter and sat on top of it, leaning against the wall. Dallon suddenly saw this room as a church, the way it once was, with a normal woman on the counter chatting to her friends; not a safe haven from something out of the survival/horror videogame that he had suddenly found himself in.

“But… _Now_ there’s a plan?” Andy figured, shifting a bit so that he could stretch out his muscles. Dallon wondered if maybe he should do the same; Andy did CrossFit, he had to know something the others didn’t.

“There’s enough of a plan to update you on,” Zelda corrected. “And I hardly expect you all to follow me without being told what that part of the plan is.”

“Twelve percent of a plan,” Joe muttered, causing Andy and Brendon to snort.

“More like fifteen,” Zelda corrected, the reference either going over her head, or she just couldn’t be bothered to comment on it.

The door opened suddenly, revealing Pete and Patrick both leaning heavily on each other, the door frame, and something that looked a lot like faith. “What’d we miss?” Pete asked breathlessly, collapsing against the wall and taking Patrick down with him.

“There’s a plan,” Dallon stated simply. He watched Zelda nervously as she got off the counter and grabbed the metal box and moved over to where Pete looked like he was about to pass out from sheer exhaustion. He was, once again, totally thankful that Panic! weren’t the ones destined to save the world, especially since…

Well, Panic! wasn’t exactly in any place to save anybody, as it stood.

“Yes,” Zelda confirmed, bringing Dallon back to the matters at hand. “There is a plan. First off, we’re going to keep training. Once I believe that all six of you are fit to defend yourselves, we’ll leave. Hopefully, by that point, we’ll have a bit more information than what we have now. We’ll be better prepared. As it stands, we head west.” She said all this simply, as she took Pete’s damaged hand in her own, much more gently than any of them expected.

Dallon tried his hardest not to look at Joe at this last bit, choosing instead to watch as Zelda bandaged the other bassist’s hand. All the rest of them, their families _were_  West. Joe was the only one that lived in New York—North. And he was clearly too wary of Zelda to ask if they could make a detour to check on Marie and Ruby.

“Why west?” Andy asked, straightening up and shifting just that much closer to Joe. “I thought you said you didn’t know who or what was behind all this.”

Zelda sighed. “We don’t,” she admitted. “And we don’t really even know if west is the right direction. For all we know, ground zero could be on a different continent, even. But we’re going west because I do know one thing. And that’s that there’s a lot of suspicious activity out that way, and there has been for a while now.”

“Suspicious how?” Patrick wheezed, looking like he wasn’t sure he wanted to know the answer.

“Any of you ever see Supernatural?” Zelda asked. Dallon cautiously raised his hand. Breezy really liked it, back before they changed executive producers and everything fell apart. She looked at him and smiled mirthlessly. “Season five suspicious.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Chapter a day early because I was a day or two late last time.
> 
> As I was reading over this, I realized that I'm basically making it sound like a "chosen one" thing going on here; THAT'S NOT WHAT IT IS. I haven't fully figured out what it actually is yet, but there's not some bullshit prophecy where a Chicago-based world-famous rock band can play a song and then all of a sudden it flips an undo switch and none of this ever happened.
> 
> That just seemed important to stress, for some reason.
> 
> Follow me on tumblr at pyromanicschizophrenic


	6. ...A Little More Touch Me

“He’s tall, use his height to your advantage,” Zelda advised Patrick, leaning against the wall. Patrick looked up at Dallon and shrugged. It was clear that he didn’t know quite what she meant, and so she looked forward to seeing how he would interpret her advice. She watched carefully as both men settled into their stances, and waited for them to begin.

It was interesting, seeing how far each of them had come individually. Patrick was vicious, not at all deterred by his height or his overall lack of strength. He seemed to hold quite a bit of stock in his kicks, and after he successfully landed one on Zelda a couple weeks before, she could see why. He had powerful calves, something she hadn’t expected of the vocalist.

Dallon, on the other hand, was extremely calculating. He picked up best on what Zelda had tried to teach all of them; don’t throw the first punch. Wait, watch, learn. Find the pattern, combat it. His main problem was that while he was tall, he was also lanky. There wasn’t much in the way of muscle, and certainly nothing in the way of power. Zelda was glad he had sharp knees and elbows, but those wouldn’t be much good against Pawns, and probably not against the higher-ups.

Joe was another calculatory fighter, she found. She’d be more impressed if he had the reflexes to match, but he wasn’t very good at fighting fast. She was working on fixing that, but it was a much slower process than she’d have liked. Still, watching him spar with Dallon last week had been interesting, to say the least. The fight itself had lasted only seven minutes, but the match lasted closer to twenty, both of them circling each other and waiting for the other to make the first move.

Brendon was impulsive and slightly reckless, but he had good enough reflexes that he pulled it off well enough. He didn’t have a style, at least, which made it difficult for Dallon or Joe (or herself, if she was being honest) to put him into a box and counter smoothly. He also seemed to lack strategy, going for the most obvious course of attack, making it easy even for Joe’s poor reflexes to block him.

Pete was surprisingly good at planning ahead, albeit not good at doing so quickly. Still, he could look through outcomes in his head, see which options were least likely to be countered, and how he could counter back. Zelda realized that he must be very good at chess, a skill she wouldn’t have expected the bassist to have due to the fact that it required more than a fair bit of patience to develop. His only pitfall was that he wasn’t good at rationing his energy, and wore himself out too early into the fight. Sometimes this worked out all right for him, because his high-energy attacks required high-energy counters, but usually, it would lead to him becoming tired out while his opponent still had plenty of energy to take him down effortlessly.

Andy. Andy was Zelda’s favorite, personally. The other five, she was training to hold their own until they found a window to turn and run, but Andy? Andy, she could see taking down some of these motherfuckers. She didn’t know much about CrossFit, and she didn’t really care too much what it was. What she did know was that Andy did CrossFit, and he had higher strength, speed, agility, and endurance than the others. If this was a videogame (which Zelda had heard Joe say far too often), then Andy would be the character that the player was building their character up to be. His only problem seemed to be a lack of actual fighting experience, but that was being rectified here, so that wasn’t proving to be much of a problem anymore.

Zelda winced as Patrick took an elbow to the ribs, forcing him to let go of the grip he’d managed to get around Dallon’s chest and torso. It caused the shorter man to stagger back a few steps, and she saw Joe’s hand fly to his hip out of the corner of her eye. His bruise might have still been there, from when Dallon nailed him in their spar.

“Does this count as a window to run?” Patrick wheezed, clutching what would surely become a bruise as he staggered back towards the slightly open door.

“Do you think you can outrun your opponent?” Zelda countered. It was a question all six of them had asked at some point during their training; the answer never changed.

Patrick looked up the stairs and groaned. “If he had normal sized legs, maybe.” And he rushed Dallon again, feinting left before darting around behind him and kicking his legs out from under him. Dallon collapsed to the ground in a mess of gangly limbs, one of his elbows cracking down hard. Zelda winced, knowing that she’d probably have to take a look at it. They’d need another supply run, and soon. Especially as they approached good enough to leave.

Singer had an idea, as well, apparently. Zelda had spoken to Benvolio the night before, and he said that Singer thought he’d pinpointed an origin for everything. They had a destination, they had a chance. They might actually do this.

“That’s all, today, I think,” she announced, as Dallon failed to stand back up, especially after Patrick simply sat on him. “That is an interesting strategy,” she added, gesturing to the vocalist. “I wouldn’t rely on it too hard.”

“More weapons, this afternoon, right?” Brendon asked, doing a very good job of masking his gratitude at not having to spar. He was far too excited at the prospect of more weapons training, probably because the only person that Zelda let them train with weapons against was herself. She was confident in her abilities not to get flayed alive by the others, and she wasn’t letting them at each other with sharp objects.

“That’s all for today,” she repeated, heading up the stairs and leaving the others to do as they would. She needed to get in touch with Singer himself, not other people who may have misunderstood, or not gotten the full story. “Enjoy the time to rest. Supply run tomorrow at dawn.”

* * *

“How long do you think it’s been?” Pete asked quietly, staring out the window. Joe would guess it was sometime in the early afternoon, but he was never good at telling time based on the sun’s position in the sky. Also, he had no idea if the clocks had changed while they’d been here. Was Daylight Savings even relevant, now that the world was ending?

“Honestly?’ Andy asked, handing water out to the rest of them. It was something they’d come up with, on the days that Zelda disappeared after their training sessions. They alternated who was in charge of making food, who was in charge of handing out water, who was in charge of bandaging the others up. Patrick was poking diagnostically at Dallon’s elbow from where he’d banged it on the ground, but it didn’t look too bad. It was moving, at least. “I don’t really think it matters, anymore.”

“Don’t say that,” Brendon snapped. “Of course it matters.”

Joe wanted to agree with Brendon, to tell Andy off for being hopeless and sounding like he was giving up. But…did it matter at this point? Was time really relevant, when the fires were getting less frequent and more people were staggering helplessly across the sidewalks? Within the walls of the rundown church, Joe could almost believe that there was a chance that they’d save the world, but out there? Out there it looked like it was too late.

“I’d guess a couple months,” Dallon offered, looking out the window himself. There were still some trees, that hadn’t been burnt down. They were starting to change colors, so the season must have changed while they were holed up inside. “The drugstore won’t be good anymore, though,” he added. “Where is she planning on taking us?”

“I have an idea,” Patrick started, “but I really hope I’m wrong.”

“Oh, that’s comforting,” Joe mumbled. He had sparred Andy earlier, before Patrick and Dallon had gone up, and it left him feeling sore and exhausted. He loved Andy, he did, but damn did he hate having to fight him. The fucker was way too good at everything.

“Where is there that won’t have been looted empty after two months, though?” Brendon asked. “No matter what, there can’t be that many options.”

“There’s a shopping mall,” Patrick explained. “I went there with…” He trailed off, letting the others fill in the gap. “There didn’t seem to be a lot of residential areas around it, and it’s accessible through the subway.”

“Even if I had zero videogame experience and nobody with real-life experience, I’d have raided the shopping mall,” Joe pointed out. “And I’m sure that she knows that.”

“She does have a habit of underestimating the intelligence of _normal_  people,” Brendon muttered scathingly.

“I think I know the mall you’re talking about,” Pete offered. “The closest residential areas would be the kind you’d move into with your families. The world’s ending, and you’ve got small children. It’s not worth the risk. Even if it has been looted, there are so many stores and so much shit that there’ll have to be something left. It’s the best bet.”

“We still need food,” Andy pointed out sensibly. He sat down beside Joe and leaned his head against the wall. “And I doubt a shopping mall has any grocery stores.”

“We’re leaving soon,” Joe announced. He had no evidence to back up his claim, but looking at everything from the past few days, he couldn’t help but feel like he was right. They were getting better at fighting; all of them were. And Zelda was disappearing into the other side of the church for longer and more often, probably talking to her network of friends, getting information and developing a better plan than ‘head west.’ Joe gave it a couple more days, tops.

“How the hell do you know that?” Brendon demanded. “Are you her favorite now? She didn’t tell me anything when I was her favorite.”

“You haven’t been her favorite yet,” Pete pointed out. “And Patrick’s her favorite, right now.”

“I’m gonna be her favorite, next,” Brendon declared, flopping backwards and closing his eyes. “I didn’t do anything today, why am I so tired?”

Joe didn’t say anything, didn’t explain why he thought they were leaving soon or how he knew he was right. He just closed his eyes and tried not to think about his favorite girls, the way he always did when he was on the verge of sleep.

* * *

Patrick hated dawn. He had _always_  hated dawn. Patrick Stump was not, nor had he ever been, a morning person. At least, not until he started sleeping in an empty room with a massive floor-to-ceiling window with no curtains, blinds, or other such way of blocking out light. Still, he found ways to keep the light from waking him up too early, and therefore managed to sleep a couple hours past sunrise. He thought it was very kind of Zelda to let him get away with that, too.

So to be kicked awake before the sun was even up was enough to make him shoot his arm out and grab the ankle of the person doing the kicking, pulling with just enough force that whoever it was tumbled to the ground.

“When all’s said and done, and we go back to touring,” Pete’s voice said from where he’d landed, “I feel bad for whoever has to wake you up. And I felt bad for them before.”

“Remember when that was your job?” Andy asked from somewhere on the other side of the room.

“It wasn’t his _job_  so much as he was enough of an idiot to enjoy waking the sleeping Patrick-dragon,” Joe reminded him. “And we were smart enough to keep back and let him.” He sighed. “You know, I kind of miss the shitty van days.”

“Get up, Patrick,” Zelda interrupted, somewhere near the door. “And take everything you need. We aren’t coming back.”

_That_  got Patrick up. “What?”

“We’re leaving. You’re all good enough to hold your own, and we really have to get a move on doing something,” Zelda explained. “We’ve been here long enough.” She disappeared into the kitchen and started stacking water bottles up on the counter.

Patrick climbed to his feet and helped Pete up. “I guess we’re just leaving the guitars here, then?” he whispered.

Pete shrugged. “If you can come up with a decent argument for why we need them, I’ll fight for them.”

Patrick shook his head. “We’ll need your lack of self-preservation to convince her to detour to New York, check on Joe’s family.”

“I’m not sure it’s worth it,” Dallon cut in, coming over and glancing back at the guitarist. “Andy asked her where we’re going when he woke up. New York’s way too far out of our way, and we’re not going to be stopping by Chicago, either.”

“What about…”

Dallon shook his head before Pete could finish his question. “Zelda said Kansas. We’re stopping well before we get to California. I don’t think any of us are going to be happy about this.”

“Did she say where we’re going for our supplies, at least?” Patrick asked.

Dallon shrugged. “I’m surprised she told Andy the end game, to be honest. She tends to wait to tell us anything until we’re all around to hear.”

“Grab as many water bottles as you can,” Zelda called. “We’ll need them. Grab anything else you think you might need. And if any of you,” she glared directly at Pete, “make an attempt to say you need your guitars, you will be brutally reminded of how quickly I can still take you down.”

“Why do you just assume that _I’d_  be the one arguing for that?” Pete demanded. Patrick shot him an incredulous glance out of the corner of his eye.

“Because you’re still an idiot,” Zelda said simply. “Albeit not quite so bad as you were when you first got here.”

Pete dramatically clutched at his chest and staggered back a couple steps. “That’s the nicest thing you’ve ever said to me.”

The sad part, Patrick thought to himself, was that Pete wasn’t exactly wrong.

“So what’s the plan, exactly?” Brendon asked with a yawn, shoving a couple water bottles into his pockets.

“There’s a mall out in NoVa,” Zelda started. “We get there using the Metro tunnels. Then we go South, to Quantico. I’ve got a friend that can get us enough MREs to last us long enough to get to Lebanon.”

Patrick blinked. _Lebanon_? Like, the _country_?

“Kansas,” Zelda elaborated, seeing the looks of confusion on everyone’s faces. “Geographical center of the continental US, and it looks like a pretty solid ground zero for everything. Whoever’s behind this, that’s gotta be where they are.”

Patrick pulled up a map in his head. To get to Kansas from Quantico, they would be passing through Illinois, just not through the part of Illinois that Chicago was in. It couldn’t be that big a detour, though, could it? If they just wandered a _teeny bit_ …

It wouldn’t be fair, though. Not to anyone else. Even if they did wind up in Chicago somehow, he would be the only one able to see how his family was doing, and he couldn’t do that to everybody else. Especially not since there was absolutely no hope for the others to see their families at all.

“Well, let’s get a fucking move on,” Brendon called, looking far too happy about getting to leave their cozy little safehouse.

_No matter what_ , Patrick promised himself, _I will see them again._  He had to.

* * *

“I have a concern.”

Andy held his breath as he waited for Zelda’s reply (so, it seemed, did everybody else). She and Pete may have been on better terms than they were two months—or however long it had been—ago, but it was doubtful that the best course of action was to start shit while they were still less than ten minutes away from the church.

“And what is that, Pete?” Zelda intoned, withdrawing a tiny flashlight from one of her boots and powering it on. It was surprisingly bright.

“Aren’t the DC Metro rails electrified?” Pete demanded, gesticulating wildly at the (possibly deadly) train track.

“Look at the lights in the tunnels,” Zelda ordered. Everyone leaned over each other to look.

“What lights?” Joe questioned after a moment. “It’s pitch black.”

“Exactly,” Zelda confirmed, hopping off the platform. “There’s a generator in the church basement. It’s the only reason we have power, and one of the reasons we left today. There isn’t much more juice in it. The tracks _were_  electrified,” she added. “But there’s no electricity to electrify them anymore.”

Andy still wasn’t sure about the idea of hopping down onto a once-electrified subway track in cheap drugstore flip-flops, which were already starting to fall apart despite only being worn three or four times. He wasn’t exactly sure about doing anything in cheap drugstore flip-flops, though; he just knew he’d rather have them than no shoes at all. He shrugged and hopped down, growing increasingly nervous at the thought of what could be in the tunnels.

“Okay, but subway rats,” Joe proposed, stepping back from the platform warily. “Derailed trains? The things that want to _kill_  us?”

“You’re from New York, aren’t you?”

Joe blinked. “I live there, yes.”

“You’ll be pleased to note that subway rats are considerably less terrifying when you’ve learned to fight the things that want to kill you,” Zelda said with a falsely bright grin. “Now, I’m going this way, and I have the light. Do with that what you will.”

“I don’t think DC is as bad as New York, if that helps?” Brendon said uncertainly, clambering down onto the track to stand beside Andy. “And we probably should get going.”

“I’m not dead yet,” Andy offered, seeing the looks of doubt on everyone else’s faces. “And I’m wearing shitty flip-flops, so that’d have happened pretty quickly.”

Nobody seemed able to find fault with that logic, so they all climbed down from the platform and followed the light.

“What, uh…What do you think’s waiting for us?” Joe asked Andy quietly, sidling up beside him. “In Kansas?”

It was a good question, Andy had to admit. What was waiting for them? Zelda had said that her contact thought it was the epicenter for all this apocalypse bullshit going on, but what could possibly have caused all this to begin with? Black magic? Light magic gone horribly wrong? Some errant fans attempting to bring MCR back?

“Probably some fuck-up Satanic cult,” he said after a moment.

“Trying to summon the great Beelzebub,” Brendon cut in, using his ‘spooky voice’ for emphasis.

“Please,” Zelda huffed from the front of the group. “It’s too widely debated which sin Beelzebub was Prince of, and none of them are interesting. The fuck-up Satanic cults are always either summoning the Devil himself, or Asmodeous, Demon of Lust.”

“What the fuck are you going to do with a lust demon?” Pete demanded.

“Sell your soul for a bigger dick, probably,” Patrick replied. Andy had to admit, he could see his logic. Fuck-up Satanic cults in TV and movies were almost always teenagers, and teenage boys would do absolutely anything for a couple extra inches.

“Go big or go home,” Joe noted, making Brendon snicker in amusement.

“I’m about to hit you,” Zelda threatened. Andy couldn’t tell if she was talking to Joe or Brendon, but either way they both shut up. “Thank you.” She waited a moment, then added,

“You’re probably right though. We think that all this is just a result of a ritual or spell gone awry.”

“This is…pretty awry,” Dallon pointed out.

The light bounced as Zelda shrugged. “The thing is, the more people you have involved with casting a spell, the harder it is to get it the way you want it. Magick is more intent than anything else, and if you have a lot of people, then you have a lot of intent. Some of it conflicting, some of it not. Then there’s the matter of using the wrong kind of herbs, or the wrong stones. If you don’t actually know what you’re doing, you can channel or emphasize negative energy, and if the most strongly united intention is a negative one, you’re basically fucked.”

None of that really made sense to Andy, mainly because he didn’t exactly believe in magic. He certainly didn’t believe in it on the level it would require to kickstart the motherfucking apocalypse. Then again, he didn’t really believe that strongly in any sort of supernatural forces, so he’d have to accept that _something_ (more like _everything_ ) was actually real and he was just as clueless as the dumb teenagers that were probably behind this whole thing.

“Did that explanation sound like bullshit to anyone else?” Pete asked lowly. “Or was that just me?”

“Given that my knowledge on magic and spellcasting is practically nonexistent, I’m just not gonna question it,” Dallon admitted, throwing his arms up in exasperation. “Which is probably how I should have started this whole thing out.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> "Go big or go home" is the single greatest line I have ever and will ever write I'm absurdly proud of that.
> 
> I asked a friend of mine (who identifies as a witch) to look over Zelda's explanation, she said it wasn't so far off the wall that it became a stretch. Don't fuck with magic(k) kids, always have a responsible witch around to help you out.
> 
> Follow me on tumblr at pyromanicschizophrenic :)


	7. West Coast Smoker

“Fucking…I thought she was fucking _smart_ ,” Pete hissed under his breath, shoving some clothes into the LL Bean bag Zelda had shoved into his arms half an hour ago. “Splitting up? _Splitting up_? You don’t split up in a horror movie!”

“Except this isn’t a _horror_  movie,” Dallon pointed out, reveling in the feel of the brand new, _clean_ t-shirt he was now wearing. “It’s an apocalypse movie.”

“It’s a horror movie if the cause of this is a Satanic ritual gone wrong,” Pete snapped back. “And either way, splitting up is still a no.”

“We’re covering more ground, Pete. And it’s not like we can’t defend ourselves now.”

Dallon had a point. Pete could still feel the sheathed kukri knife he had tucked into his waistband, and the Swiss army knife in his back pocket. It was a strange feeling, one he still wasn’t accustomed to. He felt lighter on his feet, even just standing still, and he had certainly been shocked when he caught the hiking boots Zelda had thrown at him in the LL Bean store without even thinking. It was hard to forget that the band probably wouldn’t need a bodyguard anymore (provided they were able to stop all this in time) when he could feel the way his muscles were always tensed for a fight whenever he crossed his arms.

“Still don’t like the idea of splitting up,” he grumbled, finding a pair of sunglasses and throwing them on. He didn’t care if they were useless and unnecessary; they looked cool and brought back some semblance of normal.

“If it makes you feel any better, she seemed like the only one that was okay with it.”

It helped a little bit, admittedly, but Pete would rather she was the one that was uncomfortable with the current arrangement, if only for that tiny bit of satisfaction.

“Do you really need the sunglasses?” Dallon asked after a moment, when Pete let the matter drop.

Pete shrugged. “Something tells me we’ll be sleeping during the day more than at night,” he reasoned. “They’ll block out the sun.” It was mostly bullshit, and he was pretty sure Dallon could tell, but as long as he wasn’t actually wrong, Zelda probably wouldn’t say anything about it.

Well, she probably would anyway, but at least he could pretend that he had a good reasoning behind it.

“Why would we be sleeping during the day?”

“It’s cold,” Pete explained. “And it’s even colder at night. You want to be mobile during the coldest hours because it’ll decrease the chances of hypothermia.”

Dallon groaned as he adjusted his bowie knife to sit more comfortably in his new jeans. “All that training to fight off Pawns and Brawlers, only to be defeated by nature.”

“Dude, we are _not_  fighting off Brawlers,” Pete reminded him, remembering the massive monsters from outside the drugstore that day, and the way his heart stopped when they turned around and saw them. Much as he’d have liked to be able to say that he could fight off something Zelda couldn’t, he would much rather get to see Meagan and the boys again. And he doubted Dallon would actually want to fight one of them, after watching them kill half his band.

“All that training to survive Pawns and Brawlers,” Dallon amended, “only to be…” he trailed off, eyes widening as he caught sight of something behind Pete.

Pete wheeled around and found himself staring at something that was neither Pawn nor Brawler. Its skin was still grey, but more like the ashen pallor of a corpse than their darker grey. It regarded the two bassists with eyes so green they looked radioactive, and far more intelligence than Pete had come to expect from the creatures of the apocalypse.

“Uh…Hi? Pete tried, hoping he could just pretend that this wasn’t happening. “Can we…help…you?”

“Pete, what are you doing?” Dallon hissed under his breath.

“Bullshitting my way through,” Pete hissed back.

“ _A labishna sen_.”

Pete winced at the cold voice the creature spoke with. It felt as if the temperature of the room itself dropped a few degrees. “No hablo ingles?” he squeaked after a moment, trying to map out the best escape route. He had no idea how fast this thing was, or how strong. All he knew was that this one _spoke_ , and that was definitely not a good thing.

“ _Ke essrel a labishna sen_.”

Pete slowly pulled his kukri knife out from his waistband and readied himself for the worst. He felt more than saw Dallon doing the same.

“What, uh…What’s your name?” he tried. The thing didn’t answer, just blinked its too-bright green eyes and tilted its head to the side, the same way Bowie always did when he wanted something.

“ _Ke essrel a labishna sen_ ,” it repeated.

“Yeah, man. We heard you the first time.”

Suddenly, before Pete could so much as _blink_ , the thing was right in front of him with its hand around his throat, and Dallon was sailing through the air and crashing into a t-shirt display table.

“ _Sal labshna sen_ ,” it hissed. “ _Ke essrel sal_.”

Pete shot a kick out at the thing’s legs, but it didn’t seem to faze it in the slightest. His lungs were burning, and he could feel his grip on the kukri knife slackening. He glanced over to where Dallon had landed, but it didn’t look like he’d gotten up yet. He shot out another kick as his vision started to blur around the edges, but the thing’s grip only seemed to tighten further.

* * *

“What do you think the chances of stumbling through Chicago are?” Brendon asked Andy as he sifted through the pairs of jeans, trying to figure out what his waist size was now that he’d been eating just enough to survive for the past few weeks, on top of an intense workout regimen.

“For Patrick’s sake, I want them to be pretty high,” Andy answered dully. “But here to Kansas is pretty much just straight West. It’ll be hard to stray that far North.”

“Yeah,” Brendon agreed. Besides, he was pretty sure that they wouldn’t have that much time to spare. They needed to get to Kansas fast if they wanted there to be a world left to save. “Would have been nice, though. At least one of us could make sure his family was okay.” The way Brendon had seen it, if they could see that Elisa and Declan were okay, then it would have been easier to believe that Sarah was okay, too. And after everything that had happened, that kind of assurance would have been real fucking appreciated.

Andy didn’t say anything for a moment, but Brendon hadn’t exactly expected a response. The older man didn’t have a wife, and he certainly didn’t have any kids, so he probably didn’t know exactly how all the others were feeling. Still, he had plenty of friends back home, and he had to be worried about them, at least.

“I don’t think she’d have let him see them anyway,” Andy said finally, causing Brendon to snap his head up to stare at him. “Or any of you. Even if we were going to New York, or LA. So it’s probably for the best that we aren’t.”

“What the fuck does that mean?” Brendon snapped.

“It means…I know my band, Bren,” Andy reminded him. “And if any of them saw that their families were alive, and okay, then they would have stayed behind to make sure they stayed that way. And if they _weren’t_  okay, then they would all be so distraught they’d be useless. There’s too much at stake for Zelda to chance it.”

“Do you agree?” Brendon asked quietly. He kind of did, but he wouldn’t tell anybody else.

“If I thought it would give them an incentive, I wouldn’t,” Andy admitted. “But it wouldn’t. It’s what’s keeping them all going, the hope that their families are doing well enough. The sooner we end this, the better chance there is that they stay that way.”

Brendon stared at the pair of jeans he was still holding, trying to think of how he could possibly respond. “If we… _When_  we get to go home…” He swallowed thickly. “What do you think will be waiting for us?”

Andy sighed. “I want to say that there will be some kind of switch,” he admitted. “An undo button or something. We’ll save the world and then we’ll be on that stage and it’ll still be summer. We’ll finish our set, go offstage. Go home. No apocalypse, no monsters, no riots.”

“How convenient,” Brendon mumbled darkly. It was a nice thought. Very cliché, as far as movies and books went. An easy way to kill off characters but have them still be alive in the end. Somehow, he doubted that would be the case this time. “You think at least one of us…”

“There’s a lot of us,” Andy pointed out. “I doubt we’re all going to get a happy reunion.”

There was a loud crash from the next aisle, and Brendon tensed on instinct. It was still strange, after years of being able to rely on Zack to fight his battles, to have developed all the instincts for himself. His hand flew to his pocket, where he kept the Black Widow knife Zelda had given him. “Guess this is our chance to see if we’ve actually learnt anything,” he whispered. Andy nodded minutely, pulling out his karambit.

Brendon listened carefully to the direction the creature on the other side of the shelves moved. It seemed to be moving in the direction opposite the exit, which was good news. He gestured towards the exit, silently suggesting to Andy that they leg it the fuck out of there. Andy nodded, and they took off for the door, only to find it blocked off by something that looked suspiciously like the checkout counter.

“Climb?” Andy suggested.

Brendon shot a look behind him, seeing that there were three lanky grey creatures ambling after them. “Are those the Pawn things Zelda keeps mentioning?”

Andy turned around and stiffened, making a tight sound that could be taken as an affirmative.

“We fight these ones, right?” They were moving faster than the Brawlers had, and Brendon wasn’t sure that he’d be able to make it over the makeshift barrier fast enough.

“I don’t really see a choice,” Andy pointed out, readying himself for a fight. Brendon steeled himself before rushing the Pawn on the far left.

* * *

“How do you think the others are doing?” Joe asked, kicking listlessly at the table displaying _candles_  of all things. They’d split up going for different necessities, and he and Patrick were at the Bath and Body Works trying to find deodorants that weren’t marketed mainly for women. They tended to be weaker than men’s deodorant, and he knew from experience that they’d need _really_  strong deodorant.

“I’d rather just worry about ourselves right now, honestly,” Patrick mumbled, wandering into the back of the store. Joe could tell he was thinking about the chances they’d be passing through Chicago, but he was pretending that his priority was himself first and everyone else second. “I’m sure we can trade stories around the campfire tonight.”

“Do you remember that conversation we had when we first got here?” Joe asked after a tense moment. “About if we ever became cynical, we’d slap some sense into each other?”  
Patrick was silent for a moment, pretending to look at the air fresheners, even though they were totally useless in their current situation.

“I’m not sure what you want me to say,” he said finally, voice tight. “I’m sure the others are fine? I’m not. I’m not even sure _we’re_  fine. What the fuck _is_  fine, anyway? I was never sure what that standard was in the first place, what is it now that the world’s ending?”

“Alive,” Joe said simply. “Your heart’s beating and you aren’t alone.”

“And what about our families?” Patrick snapped, wheeling around. “Are they _fine_? Joe, I’m being stretched thin, worrying about us, and Elisa, and Declan, and Pete and his family and your family and Dallon’s family and Sarah and—”

“’Trick,” Joe said softly, crossing the store and placing his hands on the singer’s shoulders. It hadn’t escaped his notice that Pete’s was the only of their names that popped up in Patrick’s list; he still had a bit of a death wish, even though he wasn’t quite as persistent anymore. “I know. All of us, we’re all in the same place. But that’s _good_. We’re in this hell together. You aren’t _alone_. We’re going to make it through this. You just have to go a step at a time.”

“Well isn’t that _touching_?”

Joe was impressed by his and Patrick’s reflex times; before the newcomer had even finished speaking, the two of them were shoulder-to-shoulder, weapons drawn, and ready to fight.

“Who are you?” Patrick demanded, voice surprisingly even, given how close to a panic attack he had been just a minute before.

The stranger laughed; guttural and almost animalistic. Joe took a moment to actually look at the thing. It certainly wasn’t human, whatever it was, but he couldn’t determine what exactly it was that made that obvious (besides its voice). It didn’t have grey skin, its eyes were an almost natural shade of blue, and it wore _clothes_. There was just something…wrong, about it.

“Ask no questions, _labishna sen_ ,” it said, in that same terrifyingly guttural voice. “And I shall tell no lies.”

Joe tightened his grip on his machete. He had liked getting the big knife when Zelda first gave it to him, and had hated it during training. Now, looking at this unknown and unanticipated addition to the enemies’ lineup, he was especially glad. He could tell Patrick was in a similar place with his dagger, which was a couple inches shy of being classified as a sword.

“Lavish sin?” Patrick repeated, confused.

“ _Labishna sen_ ,” the thing corrected. “It’s what the Brigade call you. There’s one of them floating around here somewhere, found a friend of yours.” It took a carefully calculated step forward, making it more difficult for the two musicians to make it around it and run. “But that’s no matter. He’s already dead, I’m sure.”

Joe stiffened. _Dead?_  That had to be a new record, honestly. They finally get to go out on their own, use their training in a real-life situation, and almost immediately, at least one of them was gone. This was bad, this was so—

“Why?” Patrick demanded, voice wavering just barely, so that Joe only caught it because he’d known the other man since they were teenagers. “Why are you after _us_?”

“I get paid well,” it said simply.

“Paid?” Joe repeated incredulously. “Paid in _what_? The economy’s collapsed, dude.”

It smirked, something that set off extremely loud warning bells in the back of Joe’s mind.

“I get to eat _labishna sen_ ,” it answered gleefully, taking another step forward. “And all their friends, too.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Oops.


	8. The (After) Life of the Party

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Quick recap: Dallon was thrown into a table, Pete's getting strangled, Andy and Brendon are cornered by some Pawns, and Joe and Patrick are about to get eaten. And that's what you missed on Glee.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Guys, guys. Guys, look. 
> 
> I love you all. Okay?

“Is it bad form to cheer at this point?” Brendon asked, breath heaving as he hauled himself over the counter that had barricaded him and Andy in the department store.

“It’s not a victory until everyone else is safe,” Andy reminded him, pulling himself up with slightly more ease and grace than Brendon had used. His arm was bleeding harshly, and he’d hit his hip pretty hard on the corner of one of the display tables, but he and Brendon were both still alive. Now they just had to make sure everyone else stayed that way.

“Okay, so Patrick and Joe were at—”

Zelda ran up to them, cutting Brendon off. “I’ve got Patrick and Joe, you guys get Pete and Dallon. They’re at Adidas. Be _careful_ ,” she added, running off in the opposite direction.

“We’re fine!” Brendon called after her. “Thanks for asking!”

Andy rolled his eyes at the younger man. “We are. They might not be. Come on.” Andy was glad of two things as he led Brendon through the hallways. One, that the Adidas store was right across from the LL Bean they’d all started in. Two, he remembered the way to the LL Bean. Otherwise, they’d probably have gotten lost, taken too long, and showed up too late to help—

Nope. Not going there.

They got to Adidas and both slowed down, letting their footfalls go almost silent.

“ _Sal labishna sen. Ke essrel sal._ ”

Andy didn’t know what was speaking, but its voice was so cold it literally caused a chill to run down his spine. He saw Brendon shiver in his periphery, and knew he wasn’t the only one.

Brendon nudged his arm, pointing at a collapsed table with t-shirts around it on the floor. In the midst of the mess lay Dallon, unmoving. Andy steeled himself and turned the corner, almost sobbing at what he saw.

_That_  looked like a zombie. Its skin was the ashy color of death, its hair lank and unkempt, clothes torn and dirty. But if it was a zombie, then they were all fucked, because it had its hand around Pete’s neck and was lifting the bassist about a foot in the air.

Pete was trying to fight, kicking out at the thing’s legs and clawing at the hand around his throat. Zombies weren’t that strong, and Pete didn’t look like he was going to win the fight. His lips were already blue, and his face didn’t seem to be that far behind.

The best course of action would be to stab the thing in the shoulder; that would hopefully shock it enough that it would drop Pete and focus its attention on Andy and Brendon instead. The drummer glanced back to Brendon and held his finger to his mouth. He didn’t think it was necessary, but Brendon did some pretty stupid things in duress.

Andy only made it two steps before the thing turned around, grip on Pete not slackening in the slightest. “ _Tur labishna sen_ ,” it said with what appeared to be an unholy glee. “ _Ke essrel sal roh._ ”

Andy swallowed thickly before deciding the best thing to do would be to go down fighting. Zelda had said at least six times a day that running away was always the best option, but he wasn’t leaving Pete behind. He’d fight to get him back or die trying. He started to rush at the thing before something came flying at him. It took him a moment to realize it was his barely conscious bassist, by which point he’d already been knocked over.

He stood up, slinging Pete’s arm over his shoulder. A quick glance showed Brendon picking up Dallon in the same way. “Come on,” he called, starting to run away. Fuck that thing, whatever it—

“ _Ke essrel labishna sen_ ,” it said, suddenly appearing in front of them, blocking their path.

Andy wasn’t sure the best place to stab the thing, but he still had his knife out, and so he had to try something. In a fluid motion, he’d brought the blade up and pierced one of the creature’s too-green eyes. It hissed in pain and backhanded Andy, sending him flying across the store and into a shelf of running shorts. He could only hope that Brendon had been able to get Dallon out of there safely.

It was in front of them again, but Andy wasn’t sure what to do anymore. He felt as if he’d probably broken a rib or two when he went sailing into the shelf, and there were still the gouges in his arm from fighting the Pawns. This thing didn’t seem to have any kind of weaknesses, and Zelda hadn’t warned them about anything like this. He wasn’t even sure if she _knew_  about anything like this.

He pushed himself up, still certain that he refused to die easily. He may not have a wife or any kids to go home to, but he loved his friends’ families just as much as he’d love his own. And he was going to try his hardest to make sure that they got home to them.

“ _Vudetirbah_ ,” the thing hissed at him. It looked even more terrifying with just one eye. Andy wondered if stabbing it in the other one would incapacitate it enough to escape. Was it even seeing with its eyes, or were they just for show? What _was_  this thing?

There was a loud commotion near the entrance suddenly, and Andy really hoped it was some kind of help, not another… _anything_ , really, attacking Brendon on his way out. He almost cheered when he saw Joe sneaking up behind the thing, machete raised. If anything killed anything, it was decapitating it with a machete.

Except in this case, apparently. The machete lodged itself part way into the thing’s neck, but didn’t seem to make much more difference than a butterknife on an icecube. The thing staggered back in shock, though, and Andy and Joe both grabbed Pete and ran for the door, hoping against all hope that the thing stayed distracted until they could get away.

* * *

Zelda could have kicked herself. Brendon and Andy had fared fine, initially. The Pawns were simple and expected. They knew what to do with Pawns, knew how to handle them. They were no stronger than a normal human, no more difficult to kill. But the other four…

Zelda had known that they’d encounter new layers of the hierarchy, even worse creatures than she’d seen so far. Singer had warned her from the beginning that there would be more, worse. But on the first day, at the first _stop_ , they’d run into _two_.

Patrick and Joe hadn’t been too poor off. It was just that their enemy didn’t appear to be mortally wounded anywhere, even where It would have made sense. It had looked like Patrick had actually stabbed through its neck and it hadn’t done anything. So they cut off its arms and legs instead, made it impossible for it to go anywhere. They’d cut off the head for good measure, too.

The thing that attacked Pete and Dallon, though…That was _bad_. Dallon had woken up as they left the mall, but Pete was still leaning heavily on Joe as they entered into the line of trees that lined the highway.

“It doesn’t look like that thing followed us,” she said finally, dropping her bag down on the ground. “We’ll patch up here, but after that we really should keep traveling. We’ve only got enough food to last us a day; we _need_  to get to Quantico as soon as possible.”

Pete glared up at her, but appeared too weak to say anything. While she was glad he was holding his tongue, she was considerably less glad that it was because of the hand-shaped bruise blossoming on his throat. She ignored him, continuing on, “Open wounds first, then I’ll check for concussions and broken bones. Deal?”

Everyone nodded in agreement, even Pete seeming to accept that this was a good idea, so Zelda moved over to Andy to take a look at his arm. It looked as though one of the Pawns had clawed at his arm, leaving four gouges about half an inch deep each, running from halfway up his upper arm down to near his wrist. “The bleeding’s slowed down enough, I’m not gonna have to cauterize it.”

“Oh thank God,” Andy mumbled under his breath. Zelda couldn’t blame him. She had a scar on her side from falling on a knife when a Brawler threw her; Murdock had cauterized it and stitched it up for her, and she’d passed out from the pain.

“Don’t thank him just yet,” she suggested. “Stitches hurt like a bitch without anesthetic.” She pulled the equipment from the side pocket of her bag and waited for the inevitable outburst.

“Is that _dental floss_?” Joe demanded, looking down at the objects in her hand.

“They don’t use the thread you can find in stores to stitch wounds,” Zelda explained. “The only readily available alternative close enough to suture thread in strength and size is uncoated dental floss. So yes, that is exactly what it is.”

“Mint?” Pete croaked, following it up with a harsh cough. Zelda didn’t respond immediately, instead pulling out a water bottle and handing it to Brendon to give to Pete. He’d need it.

“Not mint. I don’t think that they have uncoated but still flavored floss.” She took a deep breath as she threaded the needle and took hold of Andy’s arm. She wasn’t going to tell any of the guys, but she’d never actually stitched anybody up that wasn’t herself, and she remembered all too well the first time she’d been stitched with no painkillers. There was an extremely wide margin for error that she _needed_  to avoid. She tried to ignore the sharp intake of breath the drummer gave when she started to stick the needle in.

“Think of it like another tattoo,” Joe suggested in a helpful tone. It probably would have helped more, Zelda reasoned, if he wasn’t avoiding looking directly at Andy’s arm.

“Yeah,” Andy agreed in a strangled sounding voice. “Just another tattoo. Except less sanitary. In the forest. And I’m bleeding.”

Zelda took a steadying breath herself. She hadn’t realized it, but she was slowly getting close to these six idiots that she had found herself taking care of. It hurt her, though, hearing the normally-composed drummer’s voice so thick and contorted with pain.

“I know it hurts,” she said quietly, in what she genuinely hoped was at least somewhat comforting. “Believe me, I do. But I need you to stop squirming, or I’m going to make a mistake that we can’t fix.” She paused and let Andy catch his breath. She had no intention of rushing any of them if it could be helped, not when Dallon was dazed, Patrick was holding his shoulder in a way that suggested it had been dislocated—or at the very least wrenched—Brendon had a slight limp that suggested a twisted ankle, and Pete had been approximately two seconds away from being _dead_. Killing him was her job, damn it. Joe was the only one who looked like he’d gotten away without anything _too_  severe, but even he had lightly bleeding scratches on his face, and he looked exhausted.

She resumed the steady motion of sewing up Andy’s arm, but only made it another three stitches down before she had to stop again. She didn’t like how slow this was going. She was only five stitches down, and there were still three more gouges to work through.

“I’m sorry,” Andy said weakly, breath heavy and face white.

“Don’t be,” she assured him. Rather, she hoped it was assuring. “I know it’s hard. This part. This part I remember.”

“We don’t have time,” Pete pointed out hoarsely, crawling over to them and slumping against Patrick. “Right?”

“Don’t strain your throat,” Patrick muttered softly, shifting himself to let Pete get more comfortable.

“He’s right, though,” Zelda admitted. “We are kind of in a hurry.”

Joe and Brendon came over, careful to stay out of her way. Brendon took a hold of Andy’s shoulder, and Joe took his wrist and the part of the forearm that wasn’t bleeding. “Will this work?”

Zelda sighed. “Better than anything else I’ve got here.” Andy still squirmed in discomfort and pain, and he was still tensing his arm more than Zelda would have preferred, but it was a lot more manageable with the other two holding his arm steady.

“While we’re here,” Joe started uncertainly, glancing up at Zelda. “Can we talk about what the fuck that thing was?”

“And the one that attacked us,” Patrick added. “Please?”

Zelda shook her head as she tied off the thread on the first scratch. “I don’t know,” she admitted. “I have no idea what either of those were, and I don’t like that they were intelligent enough to communicate.”

“I wouldn’t call what ours did _communicating_ ,” Dallon argued, still sounding a bit distant. Zelda’s head shot up to see him starting to doze off.

“Someone keep him awake,” she ordered, startling the others. “He’s got to have a concussion, we need to keep him awake until I can check that.”

Dallon groaned and wrenched himself up to his feet, holding onto the tree to keep himself from stumbling too badly. “‘Kay, I’m up. Anyway, yeah. Not communicating.”

“What did ours call it?” Patrick asked Joe. “The, uh…Brigade, or something, right?”

Joe nodded. “Yeah. He said the Brigade called us some weird words, then said that one of them was wandering around and had found one of our friends.”

“Well, it found two,” Brendon pointed out. “But the sentiment was there, I’m sure.”

_The Brigade_. Zelda was going to have to burn that into her memory to ask Singer about it later.

“Its voice was so cold,” Pete croaked out, staring down at the ground. “And it was so fast. I didn’t even get the chance to blink before it was choking me, and Dallon was unconscious on the other side of the store.”

“I thought Andy was going to be able to sneak up on it,” Brendon added. “I thought we might actually be able to get you both out of there, that we’d be fine.”

“And then it threw Pete,” Andy recalled.

“I don’t feel like I got flung across a room,” Pete protested, confused.

“At me,” Andy amended, breathing in sharply as Zelda got to stitching up the very tip of his elbow. She was about a third of the way down the third scratch. They weren’t the best stitches the world had ever seen, but they were functional.

“Well, I can’t say I haven’t been tempted,” Zelda admitted. “Head’s hard enough to do substantial damage, I’m sure.”

“Nothing stopped it,” Joe said solemnly after a minute. “Didn’t even flinch with a machete sticking out of its neck.”

“I’m’n’a say that means if it was anyone else, I totally could have fought them off,” Pete declared weakly. “‘M I allowed a nap?”

“Nobody’s allowed a nap,” Zelda said firmly. She knew the kind of reactions to that she’d get even before she’d said it, and she certainly wasn’t disappointed. “Guys, I’m not even sure that stopping here was safe to begin with, but we couldn’t keep going with all of you in the states you’re in. Once I’m sure that nobody’s going to die, we’re leaving.” She paused. “We can rest at Quantico. Murdock has access to a bunker, we can stay there until we’re good to go again.”

“I see your logic,” Brendon started, taking on a tone of forced calm. Zelda knew it well. “I totally see where you’re coming from. But I would like to point out that—“

“One of you came far too close to death for anyone’s comfort, one of you has a concussion, one of you would have bled to death if we hadn’t stopped when we did, one of you has a dislocated shoulder, and you specifically twisted or sprained your ankle?” Zelda cut him off. “Or that Quantico is about a day’s walk from here, and that it’s probably only going to get worse from here?” She took a deep breath as she started on the last of Andy’s scratches. “I know that I’m asking too much of you,” she admitted after a moment. “And I know that I’ve been asking too much of you since you arrived. We are about to walk from the East Coast to the country’s midpoint, and we’re going to try to do it as quickly as possible. It’s going to suck. There are going to be a lot of close calls, between Pawns and Brawlers, this Brigade, whatever Joe and Patrick dealt with, anything else they throw our way, and starvation and dehydration and hypothermia. I know that this isn’t going to be easy, I really do. But we’re going to have to get to Quantico _today_  or this whole trip is going to go south _fast_.”

“It’s already done that,” Patrick pointed out sourly.

Zelda laughed mirthlessly. “Oh, buddy. You haven’t seen _anything_  yet.” This may have been a worse start than she could have imagined, but nobody had died. Nobody was going to die. They were all still good to go, still had a good chance of survival. She’s heard stories of people that found other Survivors, tried to help, and lost them within ten minutes. Within five. Sometimes, they don’t even make it out of town.

She finished stitching up Andy and sat back on her heels, watching him carefully for a moment as he regained his composure. “You good?”

“I”m sure I’ll go through worse,” he ground out, standing up and shaking off the tension he’d built up.

“That’s the spirit!” Joe cheered weakly.

Zelda stood up and moved over to Dallon, motioning for him to sit down. It didn’t take long to confirm what she already knew. “Yeah, you’re going to need to stay awake until we hit Quantico,” she sighed. “And you’re not gonna get a good sleep once we get there. Anything else bothering you as an immediate concern?”

Dallon lifted his shirt to show an expansive spread of bruising all along his right side. “Something like that?”

Zelda reached out and ran a hand down his ribs, feeling for a fracture. “Nothing broken,” she assured him after a moment. “So there’s that.” She stepped away from him and moved over to Patrick. “Shoulder?”

He didn’t say anything, but he grimaced in pain as he tried to shrug. She reached out and felt for anything out of place. She took a deep breath and shifted, placing one hand on Patrick’s collar bone and the other on the flat of his shoulder blade. “The good news,” she started conversationally, “is that there’s a quick fix.”

“What’s the bad news?” he asked nervously.

Zelda didn’t say anything, choosing instead to just push the shoulder back into place and pray that nothing heard the resulting string of profanities and came running for them. “It hurts like a bitch,” she said belatedly.

“I hadn’t noticed,” Patrick gasped, hand flying up to his shoulder. “I… _fuck_ , some _warning_  next time.”

“It’s worse when you anticipate it,” she said shortly, moving over to Brendon and motioning for him to sit down and hold his leg out so that she could look at it. “Exactly what happened?” she asked him, poking around the muscles.

“The Pawns blocked off the entrance,” Brendon explained tiredly. “I stumbled trying to climb over it.”

Zelda nodded. “It’s just twisted, thankfully,” she assured him. “It’ll probably get worse as we move, but it’s not going to slow you down too much.” She pulled out the cheaper of the ankle braces that she had with her and handed it to him. “I’m sure you know how to put that on.” She stood up and turned to Joe. “You’re pretty much good, right?”

He stuck his hand out in a thumbs-up gesture. “Right as rain.”

Zelda nodded, than steeled herself and knelt down in front of Pete. “Scale of one to ten, how bad does it hurt to breathe?” she asked slowly, reaching out and tilting his head back so she could inspect the bruising.

“Seven?”

She cringed internally. Seven was bad. Seven after this long meant that they were lucky that he was still alive—or at the very least that he was conscious at that moment. “Did you actually black out at any point?” she asked, careful to keep her voice even. “Yes or no, you don’t have to speak.” The chance that his windpipe was damaged in any way was far higher than she was comfortable with, and that was something that she’d need to get Murdock to take care of.

Pete started to shake his head no, but stopped himself. He looked like he wasn’t entirely sure about it.

“That probably means the answer’s yes,” Zelda said softly. “Try not to talk too much until breathing doesn’t hurt so bad, okay? I’m sure that’s going to be hard for you, but your windpipe took a beating. Is there anything else we need to be concerned with?”

Pete clambered to his feet and winced, but shook his head no. Zelda thought about arguing, but decided against it. She and Murdock could go through the group together and look into them each more closely. “Well then. I guess we should probably get going, shouldn’t we?”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Oh look, nobody actually died.
> 
> I love you guys.
> 
> find me on tumblr at pyromanicschizophrenic :)


	9. This Town is Wasted and Alone

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Hope begins to deteriorate.

Patrick didn’t like any of this. That’s not to say he ever really liked any of this to begin with, but he _really_  didn’t like any of this anymore. He and Joe had barely gotten away from the fucking…Hannibal Lecter fucker that had attacked them, and they probably _wouldn’t_  have gotten away from it if Zelda hadn’t shown up when she had. And then they’d run off as a unit towards the Adidas store, where he found his best fucking friend approximately _millimeters_  away from dead. He’d completely forgotten about his shoulder the second Zelda mentioned that Pete was in trouble, and had forgotten about _everything_  when he saw just how bad it had actually been.

And Zelda had looked legitimately concerned for all of them. That was the worst of it. It had always been easy to assume that she didn’t care about them, that she was only doing this because they were meant to save the world or whatever it was. But the way she was acting now, it was starting to make him think that she actually had a heart. He hadn’t expected her to be patient when Andy kept getting too fidgety, much less for _Pete_  of all people to be the one to point out that they didn’t have the time to hang around in the trees all day. He had expected her to snap, to knock Andy out or something. And she looked genuinely upset about Pete almost having died, and not because without him the world would be fucked.

He looked up as Pete bumped into him and smiled at him. “How you holding up?” he asked softly.

Pete shrugged. “Been better,” he whispered, barely audible. Patrick figured that’d be the closest that Pete would get to following Zelda’s orders to stay quiet. “You?”

Patrick let out a shaky breath. “I’d kill for some painkillers right now,” he admitted. “And I’m gonna need therapy when this is all over. But overall I’m okay.” He glanced up when Brendon shouted out a “fuck yeah” but otherwise ignored the Panic! vocalist. “Pete, I was so scared of what we’d find when we got to you,” he said after a moment. “The thing that attacked me and Joe, it said that—“

“The thing had found us,” Pete finished. “Joe said that earlier.”

“No,” Patrick argued. “No, that’s not it. It said it had found one of our friends, but it didn’t matter because he was already dead. And then Zelda said that she’d already sent Andy and Bren to help you and Dallon, and I just couldn’t…I'm already worried about...” Even now, he couldn't bring himself to finishing the sentence, but he doubted Pete needed him to. “I can't lose you, too, Pete. I can't lose anybody here, it'd be too much.”

“It'd become real,” Pete added hoarsely. Patrick nodded.

Because that was the thing. Even seeing how deserted everything was, seeing the chaos and the riots and the people on the streets slowly disappearing, none of this was strictly _real_. It was something that Patrick was aware of, acutely aware of, and it was something constantly at the forefront of his mind. The fact that the world was ending and that there were monsters out and about everywhere else, he knew that. But there was still something about it, something that was hard to _believe_ , and even with firsthand experience with getting attacked, his mind just couldn't fully comprehend just how much danger they were in. And now, now that Pete was only walking beside him because of pure _luck_ , he realized not only the full extent of danger, but also how likely it was that something less-than-desirable had happened to Elisa and Declan. And he certainly could have done without that wake-up call.

The group stopped walking, and Patrick almost threw up at the sight in front of him. They'd made it to the interstate, and there were dozens of broken-down cars littering the road and shoulders. Some of them looked as though they'd been parked, and some were crashed into each other. The worst of it, though, was that not all of them were empty. And the one right in front of them had a child in a car seat.

“Oh my God,” Andy muttered, staggering backward a couple steps. He looked sick; they all did. “He's--”

Nobody answered, but Patrick felt Pete's fingers digging into his sides and his face burying into his shoulder. He couldn't blame the bassist in the slightest, and if Zelda tried to, he'd hit her himself. The kid looked like he'd been about six, and his hair was almost the exact same shade of blond. Patrick wrapped his good arm around Pete's waist and held him tightly. “It's not him,” he assured him softly. “It's not him, Pete.”

“We should keep moving,” Zelda said softly after a moment. Patrick was about to snap at her, but she was staring at the kid too, a haunted look in her eyes. He wondered, not for the first time, what she must have been through to come to where she was now. Did the boy remind her of anyone? A brother, or a nephew? A son of her own? So he nudged Pete away, in the direction the majority of the cars were pointed, hoping it was the right direction.

“'Trick...”

“Don't,” Patrick cut off firmly. “We can't do this to ourselves, okay?”

Pete nodded, but Patrick could tell it was only because he didn't have the energy to argue. He wished that he could take his own advice, but he knew that it wasn't going to happen.

“Hey, is this a good idea?” Joe called out, as Zelda moved back to the front of the group. “We're kind of out in the open, right now.”

Zelda scoffed. “No.” She didn't elaborate, and nobody asked her to, even though Patrick could tell that they all wanted her to.

* * *

Andy's arm felt like it was falling off. He looked down at it and frowned, wondering how badly it would mess with the colorful ink. He frowned harder when he realized that his arm felt like it was falling off and he was worried about his _fucking tattoos._  He'd known that he'd change a lot training to save the world and everything, but that was just ridiculous.

And then there was the child. Andy liked to pride himself on not usually being squeamish, but he genuinely had to put forth a good deal of effort not to gag and vomit when he saw the car. While they'd been holed away in the church, the idea of casualties was something that he was perfectly aware of, but somehow it had never really clicked. Seeing Dallon unconscious and Pete almost dead had been bad enough, but to see someone actually _dead_? And a kid at that? Andy couldn't have prepared himself for that if he'd tried. And the fact that he looked like Bronx was just...Pete wouldn't be anything even remotely close to himself until this was over and he had his sons in his arms again.

“It's just a straight shot to Quantico, from here, right?” Andy asked Zelda quietly, coming up beside her.

She nodded. “The interstate passes right through the base,” she explained. “Murdock's off the exit, but this is the easiest way to get there.”

Andy hummed in thought. “Murdock's from the _A-Team._ ”

Zelda nodded again. “He is. And Zelda's from a video game.” Andy couldn't think of anything to say to that, so he looked down at the cracked asphalt as he walked.

“It's only going to get worse, isn't it?” he asked finally. He wasn't entirely sure he wanted the answer to the question, even though he was almost completely certain that he already had it. “There's going to be more.”

“At the very least,” Zelda started hesitantly, “there will be whoever—or, rather, _what_ ever—it was that started all of this, when we get to Lebanon. Now, it's possible that the Brigade are the worst things that they can throw at us, and they wanted us taken care of right out the gate. It's just as likely that the worst thing they've got that they can throw at us is waiting for us in Kansas, as a last resort to stop us before we can stop them.”

“But the thing behind all this?” Andy prompted.

“Will almost certainly make the Brigade look like child's play,” Zelda finished.

Andy looked back to everyone else—Pete leaning heavily on Patrick, Brendon limping heavily, Dallon and Joe staggering a bit out of exhaustion. Andy could feel his own head getting light, a surefire sign of dehydration. He thought about asking Zelda for a break, or at the very least for a drink of water, but decided against it. Zelda kept saying they needed to get to Quantico quickly, and Andy could see why. Get to Quantico and they could take a break to recover. As for the water, Andy may have been dehydrated, but the others would need the water more.

He almost wished he'd just hung back, stayed behind to help Pete or Brendon or Dallon. He'd already known how much was at stake—hell, he'd always known what was at stake, from the moment that they'd run off that stage. But now, having what lay ahead laid out clearly for him, and looking at how hard they'd already taken their first hit, he realized that they may not actually have much of a chance.

“Stop thinking like that,” Zelda commanded. He didn’t bother asking how she knew what he was thinking; he probably didn’t want to know.

* * *

Dallon would be lying if he'd said he wasn't eternally grateful to Pete for letting him use the sunglasses he'd taken for no real good reason. He'd heard all kinds of terrible things about concussions and the light-sensitivity they can cause, but /wow/, did he underestimate the severity of it. He was extremely dizzy, and kept having to lean on Joe for support (he would have leaned on Brendon, but he wasn't sure the singer could hold his weight). Even with the sunglasses, the sun reflecting off the tarmac and the cars was far too bright and he had to keep his eyes mostly closed. He didn't care about getting to Quantico, he just wanted to sleep.

“We're not losing you, are we?” Joe questioned, pulling Dallon out of his thoughts.

“'M tired,” he slurred. “Jus' wan' sleep.”

He felt a hand on his upper arm before Brendon said, “You're concussed, man. Zelda's right, you can't sleep right now.” He was silent before adding, more softly, “Or you might not wake up.”

“We must be getting close, though,” Joe added comfortingly. “I mean, really.”

“We aren't,” Zelda called back to them. “But we are going to take a break.” She stopped and waited for everyone to catch up to her. “We're going to eat, everyone's going to drink some water, and Dallon's not going to sleep.”

Dallon groaned, too tired to physically voice his complaint but figuring that it was good enough. Brendon patted his shoulder companionably. “I know, buddy.”

They all veered off the highway, ducking into the trees on the side of the road and sitting down.

“How much longer, would you say?” Patrick asked.

Zelda shrugged. “We'll be there by midnight, I'm sure,” she assured them. “I...I don't actually want to rush you, with the states you're in. But at the same time, I _have_ to rush you, because we don't have a lot of supplies. We didn't have enough left at the church, and our run got cut short.”

Pete snorted at her phrasing, but otherwise didn't say anything. Dallon couldn't tell if it was because he was actually following Zelda's earlier advice, or if it was because he no longer had that weird death wish thing going.

Andy was staring back the way they came speculatively, as if he was thinking something over. Dallon wondered if maybe he should be thinking about something too, but thinking made his head hurt too much for him to really feel like putting forth the effort.

“It doesn’t make sense,” he muttered, still staring out at the road.

All eyes turned to him, waiting for him to elaborate. Rather, all eyes except for Zelda’s. She kept her eyes turned down at he ground, clearly knowing what Andy was talking about but not wanting to comment. Dallon couldn’t tell if it was because she wanted them all to think for themselves or because she didn’t want to say it either.

“You gonna expand on that?” Joe asked finally.

Andy waited a moment before shaking his head. “I’ll probably just jinx it,” he sighed finally. “And that’s the last thing we’d need.” That didn’t make much sense to Dallon, but he decided it was probably best to leave it where it was. It probably didn’t make much sense to the others either, anyway.

* * *

Brendon was about to punch one of the broken down cars. He didn’t care that it was a bad idea, didn’t care that it wouldn’t do anybody any good, didn’t care that all it would do is break his hand and probably make Zelda pissed at him. He was fucking _done_.

Dallon had a concussion, because he’d been thrown across the room like a rag doll by the same monster that had almost strangled Pete to death. Andy had gotten his arm torn apart by Pawns and Brendon himself had completely wrecked his ankle trying to climb over a makeshift barricade.

He’d had to not only watch Andy get his arm stitched up, but he’d had to help keep him from squirming too much. Brendon was not a squeamish person, but that had been a _lot_  of blood. His stomach was still rolling just thinking about it; there was some of Andy’s blood on his hands, on Joe’s hands.

He’d watched as Zelda set Patrick’s shoulder without even warning him that it was going to happen. Waited with bated breath for Patrick’s outcry of pain, his string of shouted profanity, to draw forth the things they’d only just escaped.

When Pete had told Brendon and Dallon where they could hide, Brendon felt like a survivor. Like even though Kenny and Dan were dead, everything was going to be okay. When they’d gotten to the so-called safehouse, and seen that it was a church, Brendon almost laughed at the irony of it. Two wayward Mormons, seeking refuge in a house of the God they’d turned their backs on. It made him think immediately of Revelations, and the way the masses were punished for their disbelief.

He’d prayed that night, for the first time in years.

Now, surveying the damage that’d been done to them, realizing the true danger they were in, he felt like an idiot for thinking that an invisible fucking _god_  could truly be bothered to save them because he’d _asked_. This wasn’t God. This was Hell. This was a hell that they’d never escape. Even if they managed to stop all this, if the Fall Out Boy guys were able to defeat whatever force was behind everything, Andy was right. There wasn’t going to be an undo switch, there wasn’t going to be a way for all of them to wake up and have it be summer again. Stopping this wasn’t going to bring back Dan and Kenny, it wasn’t going to change the fact that Sarah could be dead in Los Angeles, it wasn’t going to change the fact that his parents and his brothers and sisters and nieces and nephews could be dead, it wasn’t going to change anything.  
Brendon was in Hell, except this Hell was nothing like a music video.

“We need to hurry up,” Andy said, breaking the tense silence that had been hanging over the group for the past couple of hours.

It made Brendon’s desire to punch a car burn more fiercely. It was one thing when it was Zelda rushing them, but Andy? Andy was one of his friends, he was supposed to hate everything Zelda’s done and disagree with her (silently, so she didn’t try to kill him like she did with Pete). But for the first time, Zelda was being considerate and not rushing them, and there was Andy, counteracting her anyway.

“I know we do,” Zelda said curtly, glancing back behind them. “I’d give it an hour, at best.”

Andy glanced up worryingly at the now-dark sky, worrying his lip with his teeth. Brendon realized, suddenly, what it was the drummer was so worried about. Still though, he was too pissed about too much to agree with him.

“Bren?” Dallon whispered, leaning on Brendon heavily.

“Yeah, Dal?” Brendon prompted, wrapping his arm around the bassist’s waist.

“We’re gonna die, aren’t we?”

The obvious solution was to tell Dallon that no, no they weren’t going to die. They were fine, they would be fine, if something happened, they’d be fine, _everything would be fine_.

But Patrick and Andy were both down an arm, Dallon had a concussion, Brendon was down an ankle, Pete had almost died, Joe was unarmed. Zelda was the only person that was fully prepared for a fight, and the rest of them probably couldn’t run fast enough if need be. They were out in the open, walking down a relatively unblocked-off road with no trees covering them, no buildings they could duck into, and now the sun had set. If something came out to attack, they were dead, and the chances of an attack were too high to ignore.  
And Brendon wasn’t going to lie to Dallon.

“Honestly?”

“No, I want you to lie to me,” Dallon said drily.

“Oh, well in that case, of course not,” Brendon said haughtily. “We’ll be totally fine. Hundred percent.” He paused, then took a deep breath. “If nothing happens, yeah. Yeah, we’ll be okay. But Dal, we aren’t in any shape to fight right now. I mean, we _will_ , to our last breaths, but look around. We’ll be in real trouble.”

“That’s why Andy keeps saying that we need to hurry, isn’t it?” Patrick asked lowly, coming up on Brendon’s other side. Pete was leaning on him, albeit less than he had been before.

“Get to Quantico before something gets the chance to attack us?”

“I think that’s what doesn't make sense to him,” Pete pointed out, voice broken and hoarse. “We’re out in the open, weak. Easy pickings.”

“So where are they?” Dallon mumbled.

“Let’s stop thinking about it,” Brendon suggested. “Andy was right earlier. Let’s not jinx it.” For all they knew, the things were summoned following Beetlejuice rules.

They slipped into silence, all of them too tired to really argue or complain anymore. Brendon never did get around to punching a broken-down car, but he came pretty damn close when Dallon staggered and collapsed to the ground.

Finally, what felt like hours later, they all veered off of the Interstate. They stopped in front of a low-ceilinged, plain building. “We’re here,” Zelda announced finally. It felt a lot more solemn than Brendon felt was warranted.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I mean, really, who needs a soul?
> 
> Follow me on tumblr at pyromanicschizophrenic, there's usually a lot of pictures of cute puppies. It'll cheer you up!


	10. I'll Check in Tomorrow if I Don't Wake Up Dead

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Day early because I'm home from college for three months yay

Pete wasn’t sure what he’d been expecting, to be completely honest. He knew that Quantico was a military base, and he knew that Zelda kept saying that there were more supplies there. He knew that she kept mentioning Murdock, and he knew that Murdock was a character from _A Team_ , and genuinely clinically insane.

So Pete wasn’t entirely sure what he could expect when Zelda led them all to a plain-looking bunker, but he certainly wasn’t expecting the door to be opened by a wild-eyed _kid_  with a manic grin that took up half his face.

“Z!” His grin, if possible, grew even wider when he saw Zelda. “And you’ve brought friends!” He stepped back to let them all pass, sucking in air through his teeth as each of them passed him and he saw their injuries. “Hate to see the other guy,” he mumbled, looking at Zelda uncertainly.

“Other guy’s got a machete sticking out of his neck,” Joe offered, watching the stranger uneasily.

“Oh, _fuck_  yes!” he exclaimed, throwing his fists in the air. “ _That_  is what I’m _talking_  about!” He turned to Zelda. “Your new friends are the fucking best, Z.” He patted her shoulder amicably. “You could learn from them.”

Pete waited for Zelda to retaliate, but all she did was roll her eyes at him. “Everyone, this is Murdock,” she said tiredly. “Murdock, this is Joe, Andy, Dallon, Brendon, Patrick, and Pete.”

Murdock narrowed his eyes. “No codenames?”

“Singer thought it’d be best to just leave them as they were,” Zelda explained. “Trust me, I asked.”

Now that it had been mentioned, Pete realized that it was strange. It wasn’t like it was hard to know what their real names were (or rather, it hadn’t been a couple months ago), but they didn’t know Zelda’s real name, or Murdock’s real name (or, really, anything about Murdock at all), and suddenly, Pete wanted a codename.

“Singer’s no fun,” Murdock complained with an over exaggerated pout. “Your first aid skills have gotten good, though,” he noted, grabbing Andy’s arm and looking at the stitched-up scratches. Andy looked slightly uneasy at the thought of the strange crazy guy randomly taking hold of his arm, but he refrained punching him. Pete thought that was probably more than could have been said of him. “Remember the first time I stitched you up? Think you actually passed out at some point.” He dropped Andy’s arm and moved over to Pete, looking at the bruises on his neck.

Pete backed up slightly. He may not have a huge personal bubble, but he didn’t like the idea of this stranger invading it anyway. Maybe he was learning something about paranoia, or maybe it was just the grin on this guy’s face, but he didn’t trust Murdock in the slightest.

“What happened to you?” Murdock questioned, ignoring Pete’s visible discomfort. “I mean, you look like you got fucking _battered._ Does it still hurt?”

Pete blinked. He’d stopped thinking about the pain, letting it fade into the background, but now that he thought about it, it did still hurt. He nodded.

“How long ago was this?”

“This morning,” Zelda explained.

Murdock hissed sympathetically. “Well, that’s a big fat _no bueno_.” He threw an arm around Pete’s shoulders, and Pete suddenly felt the urge to apologize to Patrick for forcing him to relinquish his personal boundaries to Pete’s general lack thereof; he was extremely uncomfortable with this stranger doing exactly that. “I’ll take care of you, Z’s new friend.” He paused. “I’m shit with names, which one were you again?”

Pete didn’t answer, deciding to listen to Zelda for once, even if it was just to inconvenience this new guy.

“Oh, right. Windpipe. Okay. Anyway, come with me, we’ll check out your throat. Bring a friend, if it’ll make you feel more comfortable. I find it’s better when someone’s holding your hand. Might be just me.” He immediately started steering Pete towards a separate room, not giving Pete any chance to protest. Luckily, Patrick started following him without any prompting.

“So where are we going?” Patrick demanded, stepping up so he was level with Pete.

“Right here,” Murdock answered, steering Pete into a small room that looked as though it had been set up to act as an emergency operating room. “I’m gonna check out the inside of your pal’s throat, see if there’s any permanent type damage, and see what I can do to fix it and-slash-or make it heal faster.”

Pete felt Patrick tense beside him. He ducked out from Murdock’s grip and stood a little closer to Patrick, brushing their shoulders together.

“Man, that’s adorable,” Murdock grinned. “I had a best friend like that once. Inseparable, never had to say anything to him. Understood everything immediately.”

“What, uh…What happened to him?” Patrick asked cautiously, as Pete moved to sit down on the military cot.

“Oh, he died years ago. Before this whole apocalypse shindig went down. Shot in the head, brains went _everywhere.”_

Pete blinked. He hadn’t expected that from the kid at all, but he certainly wasn’t expecting him to be so blasé about it.

“That must have been terrible,” Patrick mumbled, staring at Pete. Pete couldn’t tell exactly what was going through the singer’s head, but he knew it had something to do with how close Pete’s earlier call had been.

Murdock nodded, moving to stand in front of Pete, inspecting the bruises more closely than he had earlier. “Happened right in front of me. Still blood on the shirt I was wearing at the time. Take it with me everywhere. Dude, seriously, what _happened_  to you?”

Pete glanced up to Patrick, who took a deep breath before explaining, “There was something at the mall we were looting, something called the Brigade, it—”

“Whoa, whoa, whoa,” Murdock interrupted, holding up a hand. “You guys met the Brigade? And you all _escaped?”_

Pete blinked. Patrick looked about as confused as he felt. “You mean, you know about the Brigade?”

“I’ve heard of them,” Murdock corrected. “Nasty things. Too fast to escape, virtually indestructible. Open your mouth for me.”

Pete complied, only just resisting the childish urge to say “Ah.” Patrick looked impressed.

Murdock picked a penlight off a nearby table and shined it down Pete’s throat, making a sympathetic face. “I mean, you’ll be _okay,”_ he said after a moment. “Your throat’ll be sore for a while, and there’s what looks like some mild distortion in the shape of your trachea, so breathing’ll forever be kinda hard. But you’re not gonna die. So there’s that.”

He straightened up and put the penlight back on the table. “I am gonna let you go back to your friends. Me and Z are gonna have a nice long talk.” He smiled at them manically and walked out the door, leaving Pete and Patrick in the room alone.

“Ten bucks says they’re sleeping together,” Pete joked hoarsely, climbing unsteadily to his feet.

Patrick gave him one of those looks, one that said _that’s none of our business_  and _what are you, twelve?_  and _you’re a fucking idiot_  all at once.

Pete shrugged. “Just saying. Zelda and Murdock get it on a couple times, she’ll be less pissy for a while, everything will go well.”

Patrick’s look didn’t change, except maybe to to add a little bit more _you’re a fucking idiot_  into it. “Shut up,” he said finally. “Rest your voice.”

Pete grinned up at him innocently, letting it respond for him.

_Anything for you, Pattycakes._

* * *

“We’re not actually supposed to trust this guy, right?” Brendon asked uncertainly, staring towards where Murdock had dragged Pete. “I mean, he’s—”

“He’s a Survivor,” Zelda interrupted, shucking off her jacket and sitting down on the ground. “He’s a Survivor and a genius.”

“And _insane,_ " Joe added, all-but collapsing as he slid down the wall into a seated position. The others all sat down as well, with varying levels of grace.

“But intelligent,” Zelda argued. “I know he seems unstable, and—“

“He’s called _Murdock,_ " Brendon pointed out scathingly. “Have you seen _A-Team_? They have to _break_  him out of the mental hospital every episode!”

“He’s not going to shiv us in our sleep, okay?” Zelda snapped back tiredly. “There are cots here. Places to sleep that aren’t cold tile floors, that aren’t the _ground_. There are blankets, and pillows, and there’s even food that we didn’t get from a drugstore, with actual nutritional value. Trust Murdock or don’t, trust _me_  or don’t, it doesn’t matter. But trust the fact that this is a military bunker. Deal?”

“How long are we going to be here?” Andy asked smally, rubbing the scratches on his arm.

Zelda shrugged. “At the very least until Dallon’s concussion’s more manageable. We’ll pow-wow in the morning, solidify our plans.”

_Pow-wow sounds good_ , Brendon decided. But that didn’t change the fact that he really didn’t like the idea of staying here with a psychopath named after a character from _A-Team_. Zelda wasn’t exactly reassuring them, either. She made it sound like they were stuck at the bunker until she declared it was safe for them to leave.

“So we’re just going to go to bed, then?” Joe asked. “As if we didn’t almost die? As if hiding in a defunct military bunker is completely, totally normal?”

“Normal’s been rewritten,” Zelda pointed out, slightly less scathingly than Brendon would have expected. “How long is it going to take you to realize that normal hasn’t been normal since I pulled the four of you off that stage? Since these two—“ She pointed to Brendon and Dallon, “watched their friends get torn apart by Brawlers. Normal isn’t normal anymore. Your definition of normal is a pipe dream, and you need to get your head out of the clouds or you aren’t going to make it to Kansas.”

Brendon really didn’t like the way that he silently agreed with Zelda, even though he was glaring at her as if he didn’t. Didn’t like the way that he had been thinking the same thing even before she said it.

Brendon was coming to get used to the apocalypse, and the slight desensitization to violence, but he was not ready to start thinking like Zelda did.

So instead, he voiced the thought he was ready to voice. “Normal or not, Dallon really needs to get some sleep.”

* * *

Dallon felt slightly better the first time he woke up on his own, without Murdock or Zelda standing over him, shaking him awake. His head wasn’t pounding as if he was being hit in the head repeatedly with a hammer, more like a dull throb that he could ignore if need be. His vision didn't swim when he moved his head anymore, either. So he sat up and looked around the tiny room.

He couldn’t really remember much from the night before; couldn’t really remember arriving at the bunker at all, if he was being honest. In fact, everything after getting attacked at the Adidas store was extremely fuzzy. He had vague memories of a long walk, a conversation with Brendon about the danger they’d been in; memories that felt like a dream sequence that he was busy trying to hang onto. Then there was one memory, sharp and perfectly clear. The memory of a small child decomposing in the backseat of a broken down car.

Dallon blinked and shook his head gently. He could, if he genuinely tried, write off that memory as having been made up, and he’d probably be able to convince himself of its falsity, but something told him that he’d just be lying to himself.

Brendon rolled over then, rustling the cheap blanket he was wrapped in and drawing Dallon’s attention to him. Looking at the sleeping singer made it easier for Dallon to forget where they were, what they were there for. Awake, they all looked different. Unrecognizable. They were all starting to get this hardened look in their eyes. Dallon saw it in himself whenever he looked in a mirror, and in moments of clarity where he remembered that just a few months prior he’d been focusing on making music and being with his family, the hardened look in his eyes scared him.

Now, though, asleep, Brendon looked like _Brendon_. Like the Brendon he’d been when they met, the first time Dallon went on tour with Panic! at the Disco. He looked like he always had, innocent and charming and, even now, young. Dallon wished that he could still look like that after he woke up.

The bassist shook his head, stood up slowly and allowed himself a minute for the room to right itself around him. He was still a bit sensitive, probably would be for a few days if not weeks, but he was better enough that there was no reason not to stretch his legs.

The bunker seemed small, and yet the halls were still labyrinthine (or maybe Dallon’s sense of direction was a bit wonky from the concussion). There were two closed doors, one on either side of the room Dallon had just come out of. It was probably housing the other guys. There was a small bathroom, which Dallon wasn’t really sure about using, a room with weird looking bags stacked up inside, and some canteens. It was tempting to take one of the canteens, but something told him that water was hard to come by, and taking some of Murdock’s stock without permission would be the quickest way to overstay their welcome. There was another door down at the end, just barely opened. He could hear Zelda’s voice from the other side, and he briefly considered being a good person and going back to his room (exploring really didn’t take very long), but he also realized that this would be the best chance any of them had at learning anything about her.

Besides, Zelda wouldn’t really blame him for making bad choices when he had a concussion, would she?

(Well, she probably would, but Dallon was choosing to ignore that.)

“— _any_  idea what you’re talking about,” Zelda was snapping. It was kind of comforting, knowing that Zelda snapped at everyone, not just Pete and Brendon. (She’d snapped at all of them at some point, but it was definitely mostly Pete and Brendon.)

“I know _you_ ,” Murdock said, in a considerably less irate tone than Zelda was using. “And I know that you’re not doing all this for whatever bullshit reason you’ve been giving them.”

“The Pawns came after them,” Zelda hissed, barely loud enough for Dallon to catch it. “It was a targeted attack, Murdock.”

“The Pawns came after four of them,” Murdock corrected. “I’m counting six people with you, and one of them’s concussed. Last time I saw you, you’d have dropped him in a heartbeat.”

Dallon felt his heart stutter for a moment. That can’t have been true, can it? Zelda wouldn’t actually have left him to die, right?

No, Brendon wouldn’t have allowed it. None of them would have. They’d have insisted that they bring him along, that they try to save him.

“I would not have just let someone _die_ ,” Zelda argued. “Not even I’m that heartless.”

“I’m sure Hunter would agree with you.”

There was a scuffling sound, then Zelda hissed coldly, “ _Never_  bring him up again. We don’t need you anymore; we’ve got your supplies.”

“And what would you tell Singer, when he asks what happened to me?”

“ _Oops_.”

Dallon turned and left, silently ducking back into the room he was sharing with Brendon. He didn’t know who Hunter was, or what happened to him. But he did know that he hadn’t heard that tone of voice since he and Brendon turned up at the church all those weeks ago, and she was threatening Pete. He didn’t really want to get caught eavesdropping if that tone was resurfacing.

Brendon blinked his eyes open as the door clicked shut. “Wha’s go’n’ on?” he asked groggily.

Dallon shrugged. “Just wanted to stretch my legs a bit, you know?”

* * *

“I dunno, dude, they’re really puffy. Could be infected.”

Andy groaned in pain, examining his arm at different angles, as if he was looking for the scratches to not look terrible.. “It’s just swollen,” he reasoned, although Joe could tell that he didn’t actually believe it. “It’s normal, right?”

“Could be,” Joe agreed skeptically. “But maybe you should ask Zelda or Murdock, just to be sure.”

Andy nodded, and the two stepped out of the room. Pete and Patrick were in the main room that they’d come into the night before, Patrick saying something lowly and Pete nodding in agreement.

“How’s your throat?” Joe asked, sitting down on Pete’s other side.

Pete shrugged, that wordless _I’ve been worse_  that they’d all seen a million times. _Getting better_. Joe really hoped this was one of those times where it wasn’t a lie.

Dallon and Brendon came out of their room before Joe could turn to Patrick for confirmation though, and Joe was also concerned with Dallon’s head.

“How are you guys holding up?” Patrick asked, beating Joe to the punch.

“Oh, you know,” Brendon said, limping heavily to the nearest chair. “Can barely walk. No big deal.”

“Dal?” Andy prompted.

Dallon glanced backwards, as if he was looking for something. “Yeah,” he said distantly. “Fine. Head kinda hurts.”

Joe wasn’t an expert on concussions, but he was reasonably certain that sketchy answers like that weren’t a symptom.

“Um…Okay?” Patrick sounded like he was thinking along the same lines as Joe; in fact, they were all looking at Dallon as if they were thinking along those lines.

“Dallon, are you sure you’re alright?” Brendon asked, concerned. “Please don’t hide things from us. We’re all we’ve got left.” He sounded strangely vulnerable, in a way Joe hadn’t seen in years.

“I’m not…” Dallon sighed, sitting in the last chair. “I overheard something I really shouldn’t have heard,” he admitted quietly, still staring in the direction of the bedrooms. “And I’d really rather she not find out.”

“What uh…What kind of something?” Joe prompted. They didn’t know much of anything about Zelda; any information would be good at this point.

Dallon didn’t answer, though. He just shook his head gently and ran his hands through his hair.

Joe considered the possibility that they really didn’t want to know, but he couldn’t imagine what Dallon knew that they wouldn’t want to.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Murdock is simultaneously my most and least favorite character I've ever come up with. idk he seems to change a lot; he's inconsistent but a hell of a lot of fun. 
> 
> Follow on tumblr, pyromanicschizophrenic :)


	11. You Can Kill Me or Let God Sort It Out

“You know, when she said ‘food we didn’t get at a drugstore,’” Brendon started, picking through the tan packages that Murdock had stacked up in one of the spare rooms, “I thought she meant _real_  food.”

“‘Meal ready-to-eat,’” Patrick read aloud, staring at his own package in confusion. “Something tells me this isn’t going to taste very good.”

“Some of them don’t,” Murdock said, coming into the room himself. “Most of them don’t,” he amended. “Okay, all but like two of them are god awful. You get used to it. Sometimes there’s candy, or PopTarts.”

Andy stared down at four of the packs uncertainly. He’d long since gotten used to the idea that vegan and apocalypse didn’t mix, but up to this point he’d somehow managed to stick with it. There was enough food at the drugstore that, while it may not have been wholly vegan, was light enough on animal byproduct that Andy could at least _pretend_  that they were wholly vegan. Here, though, even the vegetarian options had cheese or cream, so it looked like he was just going to have to get over it. Get over it, or starve.

“Vegetarian?” Murdock asked, noticing what Andy was staring at.

“Vegan,” he corrected. Menu 11 didn’t look too bad, he supposed. It didn’t say ‘cheese’ or ‘cream’ anywhere on the packaging, at least.

Murdock made a sympathetic sound. “Yeah, that’s not gonna last. Vegetarianism hardly lasts, actually. It’s all disgusting. I used to be vegetarian, when I first joined up. It was horrible. You’ve only got four options. Gets boring. And gross. It’s brutal.”

Andy couldn’t tell if that was meant to be comforting, but he certainly didn’t feel comforted. He knew, logically, that at some point he’d have to eat all the things that he didn’t eat. But he’d stick it out for as long as physically possible.

“Which ones have candy?” Brendon asked, taking Murdock’s attention away from Andy. Andy wasn’t sure if that was the point, but he was grateful.

“Three, five, seven, ten, twelve, seventeen, and twenty-two,” Murdock listed off readily. “Seven has coffee, and twenty-two has hot chocolate.”

Brendon didn’t reply, but he did start searching through the packs with a newfound vigor, and Andy would bet anything that he was looking for a twenty-two. Murdock left them to their own devices after a moment, and Andy stared at the door after him.

“I’m sure that they don’t taste as bad as he made them sound,” Joe tried, moving over to sit beside Andy. He was already holding a pack, but the drummer was fairly certain he’d just picked up the first one he’d seen. “You know how people are.”

“I’m not going to subside on just these four meals forever,” Andy pointed out, hating how true it was. “Even if they don’t taste as bad as he’s making it sound, I can only live off of them for so long.” He was pretty sure that they did taste as bad as Murdock made them sound; then, Andy was pretty sure they were all awful, so it’s not like it really made much difference.

Joe looked down at the pack he was holding in his hand and nodded. “Well, I’m sure you could,” he says after a moment. “I could survive on nothing but…’Mexican style chicken stew’ until we get to Kansas.”

Andy snorted. “You survive on Mexican style chicken stew, and I’ll eat nothing but my ‘veggie crumbles with pasta in taco style sauce.’”

“That’s a mouthful.”

Before Andy could respond, Brendon shouted out, “AH-HA!” and stood up straight, holding a pack above his head like a trophy. “I found one!”

“Coffee or hot chocolate?” Dallon asked, trying to see the pack that Brendon was holding. Brendon protectively cradled it to his chest like a child—it had to be the hot chocolate, for him to be reacting like that.

_“Mine,”_ Brendon growled, instead of actually answering Dallon’s question. Dallon looked like he wanted to respond, but instead he just raised his hands in surrender and went back to looking for his own meal.

“To think, Murdock’s being nice enough to give us enough of these to last us the entire trip to Lebanon,” Joe said, not to anyone in particular.

Andy just shook his head, not really wanting to think about the military food anymore.

* * *

Dallon knew something. Zelda wasn’t sure what it was that he knew, when he found out, or if he was trying to brush it off as a weird dream from the concussion, but Dallon had some kind of information that she had not authorized for him to have. He didn’t appear to be sharing it with anyone, which was for the best where she was concerned, but not so much for him.

She stood outside the door to the room Brendon and Dallon were sharing, but she didn’t have any idea how to get Brendon to leave her alone with Dallon—Brendon’s alright spotty trust of her seemed to have careened downhill rapidly after everything that happened at the shopping mall. Honestly, all of their trust was fading fast, but that wasn’t her problem.

So long as they believed that she was on their side, she could deal with whatever opinion they held of her.

But she did need to know what Dallon knew. The only real chance he’d have had for sneaking was the conversation with Murdock, and a lot of things were said that morning that could very easily be misconstrued (or worse, interpreted completely correctly).

She didn’t care about what they thought of her, but if the others caught on that Dallon was hiding things from them than he’d lose their trust, and their trust of each other was the thing that was really keeping them going. So she knocked.

Brendon opened the door, which was something Zelda was only slightly grateful for. “Murdock wants to take a look at your ankle,” she said. It was a bit weak, to her, but Murdock had taken to checking everyone else’s injuries, so it wasn’t unreasonable.

Brendon glanced back into the room, presumably at Dallon, and appeared to have some kind of silent conversation with him. He looked back to Zelda and nodded. “Yeah, alright.” He didn’t look too happy about it, and Zelda couldn’t tell if it was because he didn’t trust Murdock or because he didn’t trust her.

She waited until Brendon had disappeared into the room that Murdock used as a first-aid room then stepped into the tiny room. Dallon was looking anywhere but her; she’d consider it a symptom of the concussion if he wasn’t so obviously guilty about it.

“What did you hear?”

Dallon looked up at her fearfully, and she sighed. She’d taken off the jacket almost as soon as they got to the bunker, and the jacket had more than half the knives she usually carried, so Dallon was being more cautious than she felt was necessary. Which was good, she admitted begrudgingly. Paranoia was good these days.

“Whatever it was, you don’t have the full story,” she said after a moment. “And you’re hiding things from your friends.” She’d almost said ‘team,’ but not only was she hiding things from the team, hiding things from friends was much more dangerous.

“What, you _want_  me to tell them what I overheard?” Dallon sounded like he thought it was some sort of a trap that she was setting up, not that she could blame him.

“I want you to tell _me_  what you heard,” she corrected. “I’ll decide where to go from there.”

Dallon didn’t say anything, just sat there staring at her. She had just started to wonder if she should have just left him to think that he had imagined it when he spoke up.

“He said that last time he saw you, you’d have left me for dead.”

He looked terrified as soon as he’d said it, as if he hadn’t actually wanted to tell her that he’d heard anything.

Zelda sighed and sat down on Brendon’s bed—if the singer had anything to say about it, she’d just punch him in the face. Immediately after Murdock had said that, he’d brought up…

“Last time Murdock saw me, every single thing I did, I did to survive,” she started, all the fearful looks she’d been getting from Dallon when he didn’t think she was looking suddenly making sense. “I didn’t have a safe house yet, which left me scrounging for shelter each night and never staying in one place for more than a few hours. I needed to move as fast as I could at all times, alright?” She couldn’t say for sure why it was so important to explain herself to Dallon; she’d never been concerned with any of their opinions of her. “Back then, if I’d been traveling with you and you got a concussion, yes. I would have left. The only thing I cared about was my personal survival, and you would have made that…difficult, to say the least.”

“And now?” Dallon asked weakly, staring down at his lap.

“And now, the primary concern is getting Fall Out Boy to Lebanon,” Zelda answered simply. “And none of them would have left without you.” She could tell that Dallon was not even the slightest bit thrilled with that answer, but she had no doubts that he’d be, at the very least, telling Brendon, so at least he wouldn’t be able to say she hadn’t been honest.

“If there was any chance that they would have?”

“Then yes, I would have at least made an attempt,” she admitted. “And I’d have left Brendon, as well. The two of you added a couple hours to our walk, at least. That was time that we shouldn’t have spared, and I would not have if not for the fact that I know that they wouldn’t have left either of you.”

Dallon didn’t respond at first, still staring at his lap. “Guess I’m lucky that they care, huh?” he said finally.

Zelda could tell that’s not what he’d wanted to say, that there was something else, but she didn’t push. She figured that being told ‘yeah I’d have left you for dead’ was enough traumatizing conversation for one day. She’d come back and ask question him again in a couple days if it proved necessary.

“Guess you are.”

* * *

Brendon had half a mind as he left his room to not actually go see Murdock, but rather to wait around and eavesdrop on whatever conversation Zelda planned on having with his bassist. But as he limped down the hall, he realized that he’d have to see Murdock eventually for something better than the flimsy brace he had around his ankle currently.  
Murdock was examining Andy’s arm when Brendon entered, and they both looked up at him. “Uh…Zelda said you wanted to see me?” he said uncertainly.

“Actually I said guy with dislocated shoulder,” Murdock corrected. “But guy with bad ankle works too. Take a seat, buddy man.”

Brendon almost turned around and stormed back into the room he was sharing with Dallon. If Zelda was / _lying_ / to get him alone than clearly there was something very not-good that she wanted to talk to him about. Except Brendon suspected that sometimes when Zelda said / _talk_ /, she didn’t actually mean it.

But his ankle really did need to be looked at, either before Patrick’s shoulder or after, so he went ahead and sat down in the spare seat, worrying about Dallon the whole time that Murdock looked over Andy’s arm.

“You look stressed,” Murdock said, moving his chair over to sit in front of Brendon. Brendon hadn’t even noticed Andy leave. “More so than some of the others, at least. Not Shoulder Guy. I don’t think anybody’s more stressed than shoulder guy. But you look more stressed than the one that was just here, at any rate.”

Brendon huffed a laugh. “Yeah, Patrick’s a worrier,” he agreed. “Andy’s pretty chill.”

“So what’s eating you, Ankle Man?” Murdock questioned, pulling Brendon’s leg up so his foot was resting on his lap.

Brendon shrugged. “What isn’t?” he countered. His wife and most of his friends were on the other side of the country, he wasn’t sure what had happened to Zack—they’d lost him in the attack, and as capable as Zack was, there wasn’t much chance that he’d survived these past couple months—and there was still the fact that someone would have to tell Kenny’s family, whether Dallon had told him not to think about it or not. And now, on top of everything that’d been on his mind this whole time, he was worried about what Zelda could have possibly wanted with Dallon.

“You’re all just rays of sunshine, aren’t you?” Murdock asked dryly. “Spending too much time with Z, if you ask me.”

Brendon didn’t bother mentioning that he _hadn’t_  asked.

“The good news is that nothing is actually _physically_  eating you,” he continued. “And your ankle could be a lot worse, given how far you walked on it.” He gently shifted Brendon’s foot and stood up, moving over to a shelf full of first aid supplies and over-the-counter pills. He grabbed one of the pill bottles and a sturdier-looking ankle brace—in fact, it looked more like a splint. He sat back down and put the splint around the singer’s ankle, handing him the pills.

“Motrin?” Brendon asked, shaking a couple pills onto his palm.

“I am a firm believer that ibuprofen cures all physical ailments,” Murdock replied. “Other people don’t agree with me, unfortunately. Also, ibuprofen has become increasingly hard to find. But you probably need it pretty bad.”

Brendon nodded, dry swallowing the pills. They’d probably help the headache, as well as the pain in his ankle. “Is there some kind of network of Survivors, or something?” he asked after a moment. He’d wanted to ask Zelda for a while, but Murdock had a more genial and welcoming aura about him than she did, so he was more likely to answer. Or at least not snap at him for asking.

“Not a network per se,” Murdock answered thoughtfully. “It’s more like…When someone manages to escape a town that’s been attacked, they run. And they eventually manage to find someone else who’s managed to escape another town. That someone else teaches the new Survivor how to actually survive. And we find ways to keep in touch.”

“Friends helping friends,” Brendon surmised.

“Allies helping allies,” Murdock corrected. “We don’t have any friends.”

“Now who’s the ray of sunshine?” Brendon mumbled darkly.

Murdock shrugged, but didn’t argue the point. “Kid, I’m gonna be straight with you. Friends ain’t exactly the best thing in this new world we’re in. You don’t trust me, I can see it in your eyes. None of you trust me; hell, sometimes I think Zelda only trusts me about 2 percent. But you all trust each other, ‘cause you were friends before. Don’t let anything change that—don’t stop trusting them, and don’t do anything stupid to make them stop trusting you. ‘Else you’re gonna get real damn lonely.”

Brendon sat in silence for a moment, thinking about that. Part of him wondered exactly how old Murdock was—he couldn’t be much older than himself, now that he was thinking about it. He thought about asking, but then remembered that he himself had no idea how long it had been since the world officially ended, so Murdock was probably years behind in birthdays. The thought made Brendon sad. He didn’t want his birthday to simply pass him by, didn’t want to suddenly be thirty, but not know if he’d been thirty for hours or days or weeks.

_Saint’s two by now_ , Brendon thought sullenly, thinking of Pete. Then, “Holy shit, we missed Joe’s birthday!”

Murdock looked up at him in confusion. “Did you?” he asked. He seemed pretty nonplussed by the completely random outburst.

Brendon spluttered for a minute. “Well—I mean, I don’t—We must have. I’m pretty sure, yeah. Yeah, we missed his birthday!” He’d also missed Spencer’s birthday, but he was trying hard not to think about the things he’d missed back home.

“Well, that’ll happen. Just gotta keep going. Wouldn’t bring it up to him, though, ‘cause he’s probably forgotten it himself.” He paused. “Which one’s Joe, again?”

“Hair,” Brendon supplied, hauling himself up to his feet. Murdock had said when he came in that he’d wanted to see Patrick, so he’d go get Patrick and then find out what Zelda had wanted with Dallon. “Thanks for the Motrin,” he added, because he was incredibly grateful for the way that the pain in his ankle had already dulled. “I’ll go get Patrick.”

Patrick was in the front room, talking to Pete in a hushed tone, with Pete nodding and shaking his head occasionally. Brendon almost didn’t want to interrupt, but he could see the way the other singer’s face pinched every time that he jostled his shoulder. “Hey, Patrick, Murdock wants to take a look at your shoulder,” he said quickly.

Patrick looked up and nodded, standing up. Pete stood up too, following him into the first-aid room. Brendon turned and went towards his room, step faltering for a moment as Zelda stepped out of it. She didn’t even spare him a glance, just stepped into another room and shut the door firmly behind her. Brendon shook his head and entered his room, studying Dallon for a moment, checking for any sign that something was wrong.

“What’d she want?” he asked finally.

Dallon didn’t look up at him, and he didn’t answer at first. Brendon began to wonder if Zelda had threatened him if he said anything, but then, “I overheard an argument between Zelda and Murdock and Murdock said that last time he saw Zelda she’d have left me for dead and she said that the only reason she didn’t is because the others wouldn’t have left without me.”

Brendon blinked, feeling his blood start to boil. “We’re not leaving you,” he said with finality. “You’re not going to die alone, Dal. I promise.”

Dallon looked up at him, terrified blue eyes brimming over with unshed tears. “I wouldn’t have died alone,” he agreed. “She’d have left you too.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Oh, shit, have I really been home two weeks already?
> 
> No but seriously, I almost didn't upload this until next week, just because I didn't realize it's already been two weeks. Thank God for me looking at a calendar.


	12. Tonight I'm Writing You A Million Miles Away

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Finally titled a chapter about how they miss their families wow
> 
> Also, because I don't think I've ever said this, all of this is entirely unbeta'd and self-edited so like. If there are any problems or anything. Just let me know.

There was an uneasy silence that settled over the six musicians as Dallon finished speaking. They were in the room that Joe and Andy were sharing, all sat together in a deformed circle. Brendon himself looked wound up, angry and scared and _young,_  like he had been when Patrick first met him all the way back when Panic! was Ryan Ross’s baby. Patrick wasn’t sure if there was anything that any of them could say to comfort either of them, because  _yeah of course we weren’t going to let Zelda leave you two behind to die_  seemed weak and almost like false reassurance, even if they genuinely weren't about to let Zelda leave them behind to die. So they all just sat together in an uneasy, uncomfortable silence, trying to find the right words to say.

At least, they did for about a minute and a half, before Pete leapt to his feet and exploded. “What the _fuck_  is _wrong_  with her?”

Immediately, Dallon flinched, Andy started trying to talk Pete down “before she hears you Pete, jeez, shut _up_ ,” and Patrick just stared sadly at his best friend, knowing that no amount of placations or reminders about his still-damaged windpipe were going to do much good at talking him down from this.

“Let her hear me!” Pete argued, so loudly it was doubtful that she _wouldn’t_  hear him, beginning to pace. “Let her know that you can’t _say_  something like that, and expect us to get up and follow her all the way to fucking _Kansas_  if the second one of us is injured she wants to just _dump_  us on our own to fend for ourselves and—”

“Pete, _stop_ ,” Patrick said softly. “Take a moment to breathe.”

Pete flared even further, and Patrick couldn’t really say he was surprised.

“ _No!_ ” he shouted. “No, I will not _take a moment to breathe._  Why am I always the _only one_  who reacts to anything _correctly_?”

“Antagonizing the terrifying woman with a knife collection is not the correct way to handle stress,” Joe pointed out weakly, eyeing Pete warily. Patrick wondered if Pete could even tell that he was scaring their guitarist.

“She just said she would _leave_  our _friends_  to _die_ ,” Pete countered fiercely. “You think _rolling over_  and saying ‘oh yeah sure of course’ is the _better_  way to deal with her?”

“I think not pissing her off into homicidal territory is the better way to deal with her,” Patrick pointed out sardonically. “She has never expected us to trust her,” he adds, addressing everyone, not just Pete. “She lies to us, and hides things from us, and doesn’t tell us what we’re doing until we’re about to do it. She very easily could have lied to Dallon. He’d have probably believed her.” Dallon doesn't say anything, but looks down at his lap in a way that Patrick reads as a confirmation. “But she didn’t. She confirmed that yes, Murdock did say that, and yes, it was true. And I hate that it’s true, I _do_ , okay? I hate that she’d rather have left you two up at that mall, and that she was apparently entirely unapologetic about it. But she _didn’t._  For whatever fucking reason, she didn’t even bother _trying_  to leave you two behind, and we’re all here, together. And we’re going to stay that way, no matter what she’d rather do.” He turned back to Pete. “We need to choose our battles, Pete. We can’t just argue with her every single time she rubs you the wrong way.”

Pete deflated finally, collapsing back down onto the ground and taking rattling breaths. “Together,” he repeated shakily, voice cracking in a way that made Patrick wince with how painful it sounded.

“To the end,” Joe confirmed, looking around the room at all of them. Everyone nodded in agreement, all mumbling _to the end._

* * *

The truth, Joe considered, was that there was something else that Dallon had overheard, that he hadn’t brought up with Zelda; perhaps this something else made the admission that she’d wanted to leave him and Brendon behind worse, and he just hadn’t wanted to talk about it anymore. Joe had noticed that there seemed to be something that Dallon wasn’t saying, that not even Brendon was in on, which meant that it was something Dallon hadn’t shared with anyone. Joe wondered what could be that much worse.

“Something on your mind?” Andy asked, looking up at the guitarist.

Joe just shrugged. “Lots of things,” he said brusquely. “Nothing to write home about.” If nobody else had caught on that Dallon was still hiding something, he wasn’t going to be the one to draw attention to it.

Andy, to his credit, just nodded his head, as if he understood. “Yeah,” he agreed. Then, “How much longer will that work?”

Joe furrowed his brow, not quite understanding the question. Without prompting, Andy elaborated, “Brendon and Dallon are still with us because Zelda wanted to get us moving, and she knew that we wouldn’t have left without them. How much longer is that going to work?”

That had been bothering Joe, too, if he was being honest with himself. But he tended to lie to himself a lot these days and so he had been pretending that it wasn’t bothering him at all. “I don’t think it’ll last past here,” he admitted finally. “We were in a hurry because we didn’t have a lot of supplies. We’re leaving here more prepared. I don’t think she’ll let it go like that again.”

Andy nodded again. “I was thinking that, too,” he said quietly. “I was kind of hoping you’d be able to convince me I was wrong.”

Joe didn’t bother to say that he’d been hoping for that too.

“We won’t leave them,” he said after a moment. “She can’t knock all four of us out and carry us all at once.” She probably could; tie them all up and drag them behind her or something, but it’d probably slow her down more than Brendon and Dallon would, no matter their states.

Andy huffed a weak sounding laugh, and Joe mentally cheered. “Do you think we might be leaving soon?” Andy asked after a moment.

Joe just shrugged. Truth be told, the only thing keeping him from wanting to stay in the bunker forever was his family; when they left, they’d be giving up consistently having a roof above their heads, the cots—as uncomfortable as they were, they were better than the floor or the ground—and pillows and blankets, and the sense of security that came with living in a military bunker. He didn’t know how long it would take for them to get to Kansas, didn’t know what was waiting for them outside, didn’t know anything that came next.

He also wanted to know what else Dallon had overheard, before they went anywhere. Joe wasn’t the most perceptive person in the group, but he may have been the most laid-back (with the exception of Andy, because very little really got to him), and he didn’t want to be in the middle of nowhere when the more explosive members (Pete) found out that Dallon was keeping secrets.

“We can’t leave until Dallon’s concussion’s gone,” he pointed out. “And Brendon’s limp.”

Andy was silent a moment before arguing, “Unless she decides to try and leave them here.”

“We won’t let her, though,” Joe countered. “We agreed. To the end.”

“We agreed we wouldn’t let her leave them for dead.”

“We agreed to stay _together_ ,” Joe corrected. Andy couldn’t be _serious_ , could he?

The guitarist took a deep breath, trying to keep from losing his temper right then and there. This wasn’t another tour, this was the end of the world, and they all needed to keep their heads about them.

“I know we did,” Andy admitted. “I _know_ , but…” He took a deep breath.

“We can’t leave until Dallon’s concussion is gone,” Joe repeated. “And Brendon’s limp.”

He was sure that there was something profound, some excellent point in Hurley’s brain, and if Andy were to find the words that he’d be right, but they’d made an agreement.  
Joe wanted to get home to Marie and Ruby. That was the ultimate end game. But until then, until Joe got his girls back, he had his band. His band and half of Panic! at the Disco.

Joe had Andy, Pete, Patrick, Brendon, and Dallon. And he was going to keep them until he got home to his wife and baby girl.

* * *

“Come on, Pete, don’t do this.”

“Do what?” Pete questioned, very distinctly not sulking, which was probably what Patrick was accusing him of.

“You know what,” Patrick said, by way of answer. Pete didn’t take his eyes off the ceiling, but he saw the singer move to stand beside his cot out of the corner of his eye.

“I’m not doing anything,” Pete defended himself. Technically, it was true.

“I’m aware,” Patrick noted. He slid out of Pete’s periphery, which he interpreted as sitting down. “Talk to me, Pete,” he added, softer

“I need to rest my voice,” Pete argued. If he were to look at Patrick, he’d probably have seen a very pointed glare, the unspoken _and that’s stopped you when?_  written clear across the younger’s face. Pete had always found it strange how, even before Patrick was a legal adult, it was always Patrick taking care of Pete.

“You need to stop sulking,” Patrick countered. Pete mentally congratulated himself for knowing Patrick so well.

“I’m not sulking.” He was starting to sound like he had back before the hiatus, when every single person even remotely familiar with the band referred to him as “Emo King,” but Pete just couldn’t bring himself to care.

“Then what are you doing?” Patrick asked, as if genuinely curious.

“Nothing,” Pete answered readily. “We’ve already established that.”

“You’re never doing nothing,” Patrick pointed out. “When you’re doing nothing, it just means you’re sulking.”

 _Not true_ , Pete argued silently. He wasn’t _sulking_ , he was _thinking_.

“Alright, fine,” Patrick said after a moment of pointed silence. Pete found himself getting pushed over, with the singer climbing onto the cot with him. “Never thought I’d find something with less room with a bunk,” he noted. Pete silently agreed; he was only half-on the cot now, the metal frame digging uncomfortably into his back.

“’S less comfortable, too,” he mumbled, shifting so that he was on his side, facing Patrick. The cot was really just a heavy duty nylon sheet stretched over a metal frame, and Murdock had supplied them with ratty pillows and scratchy blankets. The one thing Pete hadn’t missed during the hiatus was the bunks on the bus, but he found himself missing them here.

“We’re not gonna leave them, Pete,” Patrick said finally, taking a guess at what was on Pete’s mind—and for once getting it wrong.

“Not for dead,” he agreed, not sure of the best way to explain what he was really thinking about—or even if this was the best time.

“Not at all,” Patrick corrected, brow furrowing.

“They’re safe here, ‘Trick,” Pete argued softly. “This isn’t about them. Why should they risk getting killed anymore than they already have?”

“You’re the one that was furious at the idea of leaving them,” Patrick pointed out, confused. “Why are you—?”

“I was furious at the idea of leaving them _for dead_ ,” Pete corrected. “The only reason they’re here with us now is because I invited them. If they die out there—”

“It won’t be your fault,” Patrick cut him off. “They’d have died within the day, if you hadn’t. Granted, you almost died that day because you _did_ , but you saved their lives, Pete.”

“Yeah, well, if they come with us and they die, then it’s all fucking worthless, isn’t it?” Pete scoffed, pulling himself into a sitting position.

Patrick sat up slowly, too, and Pete could feel his concerned gaze. “We can’t leave them here,” he said softly. Before Pete could argue, Patrick continued, “They both want to get to L.A. just as bad as you do. Just as bad as I want to get to Chicago, and Joe wants to get to New York. We can’t leave them here. They’ll never get home.”

“But if they die—”

“Then they die trying to get home,” Patrick interrupted firmly. “If they want to stay, then they can. But don’t try to make that choice for them.”

Pete nodded, because he knew that Patrick was right. It wasn’t his choice, at the end of the day. It _was_  up to Brendon and Dallon, ultimately.

He just felt like if something happened to either of them, then he would be personally responsible.

* * *

Dallon just wanted, more than anything else, to wake up and have all of this have been a terribly vivid fever dream. He’d wanted that for a while, since this all started in the first place, when he grabbed a shell-shocked Brendon and ran from the hulking Brawlers, hearing Zack shouting after them to _just keep running_ , slipping on blood as they made their escape. Since the two had managed to slip unnoticed into an alley, breathing heavy and soaked in blood and sweat.

But right at the moment, in a military bunker in Quantico, with no clue what came next, two legitimate near-death experiences behind him and countless more in front, Dallon just wanted to be home. Not go home, just wake up and _be_  there.

“Have they checked out your head yet, today?” Brendon asked from his cot, startling Dallon from his thoughts.

“Uh…no, not today.” He closed his eyes and sighed. Murdock had told him it would probably take a week or two for him to feel completely normal, which probably meant that Zelda would try to move them sometime in the next couple days. “Hey, I never asked, how’s your ankle?”

Brendon shrugged. “Not as bad as that time back in 2011,” he said brusquely. Dallon remembered that night. Spencer and Zack had both been worried as all hell by the time the show was over, and Brendon had barely gotten off the stage before he was being dragged over to the med-tent.

“’S not an answer.”

Brendon let out a sigh of his own, laying back on his cot. “Do you think there’s any way to get in touch with our families?” he asked after a moment. “Like, obviously all our phones have died. And there are no mailmen anymore, probably. But carrier pigeons, maybe?”

“Yeah, ‘cause we’ll be able to find a carrier pigeon on the way to Kansas,” Dallon agreed dryly. He wished there _was_  something. Some kind of way to get a letter or something to Breezy, tell her that he was alive and on his way home. Some way for her to get a letter or something back to him, to tell him that she and Amelie and Knox were alive and waiting for him.

“Maybe Murdock has carrier—” Brendon shot straight up. “Zelda.”

Dallon blanched. He was still perfectly content to avoid Zelda, with Hunter’s name standing out in the back of his mind like a beacon, flashing _DON’T TRUST HER!_  with bright lights and loud sirens. “What about her?” he asked, going for nonchalant. Brendon didn’t seem to notice anything off, but he seemed too livid to notice anything at all.

“She’s been contacting people this whole _time_ ,” he snapped, springing to his feet—then staggering when he put too much weight on his injured ankle. “She’s got to have a way!”

“This is Murdock’s base,” Dallon reminded Brendon after a minute. “We should ask him first.”

Brendon still looked furious, but he seemed to concede to Dallon’s point. “We get the others first,” he suggested. “If we’re onto something, if Murdock and Zelda do have a way to get in touch with our families…I don’t want to hide something important from them.”

Dallon closed his eyes. Brendon’s words felt like Dallon imagined every single one of Zelda’s knives would feel piercing him simultaneously. Granted, the possibility of talking to wives and children and (in Andy’s case) extremely close friends wasn’t quite the same kind of important as whoever Hunter was, and who he was to Zelda, but they were both incredibly important.

And Dallon was hiding it from everyone else.

“Dal?” Brendon’s voice broke the bassist’s reverie. “You okay?”

Dallon nodded. “Fine, just…” He trailed off, letting the implied, _just my head_  settle into Brendon’s brain.

He opened his eyes when he felt a hand on his upper arm, looking down to see Brendon staring at him with unmasked concern. “Come on, we’ll get the others and talk to Murdock."

He let himself get dragged along into Andy and Joe’s room, let Brendon explain his theory, let Brendon drag him to Pete and Patrick’s room and repeat. It wasn’t until Murdock was less than half a foot from his face that Dallon realized that the small first-aid style room was packed full.

“You’re recovering well,” Murdock said cheerily, as Dallon gave up trying to let his mind catch up. “So that’s good. Why is everyone here?” he added, turning and looking at the other five men in the room.

For all of Brendon’s bravado from what couldn’t have been more than ten minutes ago, he only shifted uncomfortably when his chance to speak up came.

“Like, I don’t mind, honest, but the room’s kind of small, and seven full grown dudes is probably too many people, you know?” He stared at Patrick and Pete for a minute. “Five full grown dudes and two abnormally short dudes,” he amended.

“We just…” Andy tried, but Dallon didn’t really think Brendon explained everything all that clearly, and saying _we think you have a way for us to talk to our families_  seemed kind of accusatory.

“How do you talk to the other Survivors?” Dallon asked finally, seeing that Brendon was probably not going to be saying anything any time soon.

Murdock sighed, but didn’t say anything for a long time. Dallon started to wonder if he never would, but then, “Guys, I’m sorry.”

Brendon finally found his voice. “There has to be—”

“No, there isn’t,” Murdock interrupted. “I told you yesterday that we find ways to keep in touch. Unfortunately, all your whoevers aren’t connected to me, or Z, or anyone that me and Z are connected to. And Z won’t be able to contact anyone on the road anyway. We won’t be able to find all your whoevers before you leave here. I’m sorry, and I wish I could help, I really do. But I can’t.”

He seemed so sincere that none of them—not even Pete—could honestly find any kind of counter.

“It was worth a try,” Patrick muttered dejectedly, pushing his way out of the room. Pete followed, and after a minute, so did Joe and Andy.

Brendon looked guilty himself, as if it was his fault that he got all their hopes up for nothing. Dallon smiled at him comfortingly.

“You were right to tell them,” he assured the singer. “And Patrick is right. It was worth a try.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Honestly, the reason Murdock told them that he can't get in touch with their families is because I couldn't think of any decent forms of long-distance communication in an apocalyptic setting so I just had him say no instead.
> 
> For those of you not following me on Tumblr: I've got a job for the summer, which does put a bit of a damper on my plans of unlimited writing opportunities. There also may or may not be a family crisis (I'll know for sure within the next 36 hours how bad/permanent it is), which will also not help. At the least, you'll get up to chapter 14, because that's what I've got done. A month should be enough to finish 15 maybe 16, possibly even 17. Who even knows?
> 
> Follow me on tumblr (pyromanicschizophrenic) so you know about this^ kind of thing as it happens, and so you'll know when the family crisis is no longer in my way.


	13. Don't Pretend You Ever Forgot About Me

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> A not-so-casual reminder that Zelda's human, too.

“Z, I really wouldn’t recommend—”

“We can’t _stay_  here,” Zelda snapped, cutting Murdock off mid sentence. Murdock huffed and sat down heavily on his cot.

“The tall one’s head is still—” Murdock tried again, but he stopped when Zelda gave him the kind of look that said _shut up or I’ll gouge your brains out through your eye sockets._

He didn’t really scare easy, and he was hardly ever afraid of Zelda, but getting your brains gouged out through your eye sockets sounded distinctly not pleasant.

“Is he stable enough to move?” she asked, a tone of finality that said no matter how strongly he advocated against it, if the answer was anything other than _no absolutely not_  they would be leaving the bunker at sunset.

“Theoretically, but—”

“Alright.” Zelda turned and walked out of the room before Murdock could explain that moving while he was still concussed was a _Bad Idea._

Not to mention that Shoulder Guy’s shoulder was still pretty stiff, Ankle Man was still limping pretty badly, and the Mellow Dude’s arm still looked kind of infected. They wouldn’t _survive_  if they left at sunset.

Murdock got that Singer thought that they were the best bet to setting the world rightish. He understood that, if they were going to set the world rightish, they needed to move fairly quickly to ensure that there was still a world to set rightish. But what good was moving fairly quickly to ensure that there was still a world to set rightish if in doing so you moved too quickly and you killed the best bet to do it? A chain’s only as strong as its weakest link, and all that noise. You can only go as fast as your slowest guy, and the slowest guys just happened to be a bit broken.

There was a knock on the door, which Murdock found kind of weird. He was in his actual room, not the pseudo first-aid room he’d set up, and the only person who visited him in this room was Z, and she never knocked.

“Uh…come in?” he tried. That’s what you say, right?

(Privacy among company wasn’t something he’d had since he was seventeen and living at home; in the military there was no privacy and in the apocalypse there was no company.)

The door opened, and the tall concussed one stepped through slowly, looking over his shoulder as if he was looking for something (someone) before he closed the door.

Paranoia to the degree he’d been exhibiting since he got here was not a common symptom of concussions; Murdock would be lying if he said he wasn’t curious as to what could possibly have him that much more paranoid than everyone else.

“If this is about your families again—” Murdock started to say, but the other guy just shook his head. None of them had asked since the first time, but there was no way that they’d just give up like that. Was there? Family seemed like the primary motivator for them, the rest of the world be damned. “Then what brings you to my humble abode, Head Case?”

“I…” He looked to the door again. Skittish. PTSD from the attack? None of the others were exhibiting signs of PTSD, and if anyone had any right it was the one that had legitimately almost died. “I overheard…a while ago…”

“Didn’t Z already talk to you about that?” Murdock cut in. She had, he remembered her saying something about it to him. Some kind of _be careful about accusations, they already don’t trust me enough_  spiel that he hadn’t actually listened to.

“Part of it,” Head Case confirmed. Another look to the door. That was getting downright ridiculous. “I didn’t tell her. About the rest.”

“So, like. Why are you talking to _me_  about it?”

“Who’s Hunter?”

Oh.

Oh boy.

_ABORT ABORT ABORT ABORT ABO—_

“Nope.” Murdock started pushing the other man towards the door. “Nah, man. Staying well away from that one. Nope, nope. No. Z’s past, Z’s story, Z’s problem. Bye. Nope.”

Admittedly, shoving the concussed man was probably a bad idea, but not a _Bad Idea_ , and certainly not a BAD IDEA. Telling him about Hunter was a BAD IDEA.

Nope.

Head Case sidestepped so that Murdock wasn’t pushing him anymore. He looked down at him with pleading blue eyes. “I can’t ask her,” he said softly, and Murdock could hear the fear in his voice no matter how hard he tried not to. “I have to know. Please.”

“Bro, she’ll kill me if I tell you. She’ll probably kill me anyway, because I have no intention of telling her you heard that part, and it’s my fault you heard it anyway. But at _least_  I can tell her that I didn’t tell you. So then she’ll kill me quickly, and not gouge my brains out through my eye sockets.”

_“Please.”_

“I would,” Murdock tried. “Honestly, I’d love to. But you know what I’d love more? Not getting my brains gouged out through my eye sockets. Using the spoons in an MRE. Seriously. No.”

He opened the door wide, standing in front of it in such a way that closing it was just not a thing that was going to happen.

Head Case stared at the open door for a minute, then looked down at the floor and left. Murdock shut the door behind him and sagged against the wall. “Fuck, Zelda.” He felt it summed everything up perfectly.

* * *

Dallon had a list of things he was going to do, and he had a list of things he was not going to do.

On the list of things he was going to do: try not to die, make it home, make sure Zelda didn’t kill Brendon, try to help Patrick make sure Zelda didn’t kill Pete.

On the list of things he was not going to do: actively confront that Brigade thing again, give up on getting home/saving the world (whichever came first, really), let Brendon do something outstandingly stupid.

At the top of the list of things he was not going to do, though, was to _not ask Zelda about Hunter._  It seemed directly counterproductive to the _try not to die_  item on the _to do_  list. Dallon liked to think he was pretty smart.

“Was that Zelda’s room?” Pete asked him, breaking Dallon out of his thoughts. Dallon blinked at him.

“Uh, no. Murdock’s.”

Pete nodded. “What were you doing in Murdock’s room?” he asked after a beat.

_Oh, well, see, when I overheard him and Zelda arguing about how she would have left me and Brendon for dead he actually threw a name in her face and she got really angry and threatened to kill him so I wanted to ask him about that_  was probably not the best way to explain what he was doing, especially since Pete had a habit of getting really angry over any excuse that he could find to get angry with Zelda over.

“Just, uh, asking him about. Something. Leaving. Zelda might want to leave soon.”

Pete’s eyes narrowed in suspicion. Dallon really shouldn’t have been surprised, that was just terrible. _Note to self: come up with lie_  before _doing the thing you’re going to lie about_. Not that he was planning on making a habit of this.

“I know we never explicitly agreed to not keeping secrets,” Pete started, “but I figured it was kind of implied.”

“I…Look, let me figure it out, first, okay?” Dallon tried, bordering on begging. “It might be nothing, I don’t want to blow this up out of proportion.” Like hell it was nothing. Murdock wouldn’t have been that adamant about not telling him if it was _nothing._

Pete seemed appeased enough, at any rate, and that was really all that Dallon could have asked for at that moment. “When you’ve got it, though…”

“I will absolutely tell you guys. Immediately.” Probably not; Dallon was still pretty into that _try not to die_  thing. It really depended on exactly how relevant to everybody else it ended up. Before Pete could do more than nod, Dallon stepped into the room he shared with Brendon.

“You okay, man?” Brendon asked, as soon as Dallon shut the door. “You look kind of nervous.”

Dallon couldn’t lie to Brendon like he’d lied to Pete. Brendon would see right through it without any problem whatsoever.

“I…That argument, that I overheard Zelda and Murdock having? When we first got here?”

“The one where she told you afterwards that she’d have gladly left us for dead,” Brendon added coldly. “I remember.”

“Yeah. Yeah, that one.” Dallon took a deep breath before he sat on his cot. Brendon moved over to sit next to him. “She tried to tell him that she wouldn’t have. She’s not so heartless as to leave us for dead.”

“But she told you that—”

“I know she did. That’s not the point. The point is, Murdock’s counter was, ‘I’m sure Hunter would agree with you’.”

Brendon was silent for a moment as he mulled it over. “So…who’s Hunter?”

Dallon shrugged. “That’s just it. I have no idea. But Zelda got _mad—really_  mad. She told him to never bring him up again, and I’m pretty sure she threatened to kill Murdock. She had the same tone of voice she had when we first got to the church, the way she was always talking to Pete.”

“Damn,” Brendon said eloquently. “So, what? Did you ask her about it when she talked to you, and she swore you to secrecy?"

“I’m not asking her about it, are you crazy?” Dallon countered. “Unlike Pete—and sometimes you, it seems—I actually _don’t_  want to die. Asking her about this just seems like an invitation to get stabbed a few thousand times.” He shut his eyes and leaned against the wall. “I asked Murdock.”

“What’d he say?”

“He pushed me out of the room. Said that Zelda was going to kill him for bringing him up in the argument so I could hear, said she was going to kill him for not telling her I asked, but said that it’ll be quicker than if he actually told me.”

An uneasy silence fell over the two of them, as Brendon considered all the new information and Dallon let a small part of the weight on his shoulders dissolve—he still felt bad about not telling the others, and lying to Pete, but at least he wasn’t the only one that knew anymore.

“Murdock isn’t scared of Zelda,” Brendon said finally. “She seems to have more patience for him, too, then she has for us. So if he’s actually scared of her _now…”_

“I know,” Dallon said, because he did. This Hunter person must have been really fucking important to Zelda, or something like that, because it was clearly a very touchy subject for her. And it must have been _bad,_ whatever it was that happened to him, because she was vicious enough about it that even Murdock, who seemed to be unfazed by pretty much everything, was legitimately afraid of her. None of it added up, and it made Dallon incredibly uneasy.

“If I lied and said I’m sure it’s nothing,” Brendon started after a moment, “would you call me on it?”

“No, I wouldn’t.” Dallon was absolutely all for self-delusion.

“Well. Then I’m sure it’s nothing.”

* * *

“Dallon was in here,” Zelda said, walking into Murdock’s room without preamble. “What’d he want?”

“Which one’s Dallon?” Murdock asked, not looking up from whatever he was doing to the wall with his penknife.

“Murdock,” Zelda snapped. She had no patience for his weirdness right now—she’d suspected that there was more that Dallon had overheard his first morning here, a suspicion which only grew with each passing day where he tried to avoid her. “What did Dallon want?”

“No, seriously, I don’t know which one Dallon is,” Murdock repeated. “So I don’t know what Dallon wanted.”

“Are you telling me that more than one of them were in here today?” Zelda hissed, storming over and wrenching the penknife from Murdock’s hand. “Or are you just playing dumb? Because let me tell you, it doesn’t suit you.”

Murdock sighed. “Z, it’s not important.”

“Like _hell_  it isn’t!”

Murdock winced. “Okay. Fair point. Correction: I didn’t tell him anything.”

“I didn’t ask you what you _told_  him,” Zelda explained murderously. “I asked you what he _wanted.”_

“Well that’s a shame,” Murdock said defiantly. “Because I told him I wouldn’t tell you. And I may be many things, but a liar is not one of them.”

Zelda raised an eyebrow. “Right. You’ve never told a lie in your life, I’m sure.”

“Scout’s honor,” Murdock swore.

Zelda was pretty sure that Murdock had never been a scout, but even if he had been, “I don’t think Scout’s Honor holds up when all the scouts are dead.”

“Not all scouts,” Murdock countered. “I talked to Scout in Kentucky the other day. He seems alive and well.”

Zelda scoffed, throwing the penknife down at Murdock’s feet. “I bet you think you’re clever,” she muttered darkly. “I’m going to go interrogate Dallon, since you’ve suddenly decided to be fucking useless.” She was almost to the door before Murdock spoke up.

“Hunter.” Zelda froze, and he continued. “He asked about Hunter.”

“Fucking figures,” she mumbled.

“They deserve to know,” Murdock told her boldly, putting a hand on her shoulder. “If not who he was, then what happened. If they’re going to leave here with you, they need to know what they’re getting themselves into.”

“There are only two of them that get the luxury of making that choice,” Zelda reminded him venomously. Pete, Patrick, Joe, and Andy were all kind of stuck with her, whether they wanted to be or not. Those four needed to get to Kansas; they were still the best bet. Singer had made that plenty clear the night before.

“Then tell those two,” Murdock tried.

“They’ll tell the others,” Zelda argued.

“They all deserve to know,” Murdock repeated. “Whether they have the choice to stay or not, they deserve to know.”

“I’ll consider it,” she said finally, storming away and into her room.

* * *

_“Just so we’re clear, we’re raiding a still-active hospital?”_

_Zelda laughed, hip checking the twenty-something with black hair starting to fall into his honey colored eyes. “We need antibiotics,” she reminded him. “Or Tank will die.”_

_They both looked to the pile of blankets that was Tank—a six-six, two-sixty-five pound mass of muscle and unadulterated rage. They’d rescued him from a small town in what Zelda was sure was somewhere in Mississippi, but her partner would swear was Alabama. He was only sixteen, the linebacker for his high school’s football team, about to be crowned Homecoming King when the Brawlers attacked. They’d found him two hours after the attack, stumbling with a bad limp and covered in his girlfriend’s blood._

_It wasn’t until almost nineteen nights later that the three of them got cornered by Pawns—somewhere between ten and fifteen; none of them could get an accurate count, they were moving so fast. Tank was the only one really injured, but it was bad. Zelda almost thought they’d have to cut off his arm for the longest time. She still wasn’t entirely sure they wouldn’t need to. They’d done a pretty decent job at the stitches, but the cut wasn’t healing. Worse, it was starting to turn green._

_“It’s an_  active _hospital,” he stressed. “We won’t be any good to Tank if we get arrested trying to help.”_

_“Relax, Hunter,” Zelda said, hip checking him again. “I’ve raided harder by myself. We won’t get arrested.”_

_The good news, Zelda could say looking back, was that they didn’t get arrested._

_It started out not too bad. They avoided all the guards, got the antibiotics (and some opiates and more ibuprofen and even some real suture thread), and actually made it_  out _of the hospital. The raid itself was perfectly successful._

_They got to the tree line, and that’s when everything turned south. It started off with just two Pawns. Two Pawns, there were two of them, they could handle that. Then there were two more Pawns, until suddenly there must have been twelve or thirteen. They fought hard, Zelda felt their claws break her skin, tearing her clothes and ripping apart what felt like every part of her flesh. They almost escaped, and then the Brawlers showed up._

_Three of them, all three going straight for Hunter. Pulling him apart, it almost looked like they were about to start tearing limbs off. One of them grabbed his head, and Zelda lost what little breath she’d had left._

_“ZELDA!” he screamed. “ZELDA, HELP ME!”_

_And she turned and fled the other direction._

* * *

“His real name was Ashton,” Zelda explained dully, leaning against the wall in Dallon’s and Brendon’s room. Dallon, Brendon, and Andy sat on one cot. Pete, Patrick, and Joe sat on the other. All six of them stared up at her. “I found him somewhere in the woods of Georgia. He was fucking _terrified._  Had just seen his entire town razed to the ground. I don’t know if it was Pawns or Brawlers or something we haven’t seen yet, or even if they’re directly related. He never saw anything other than the flames. Said he just grabbed a hunting jacket and his shotgun and ran as far and fast as he could.

“Hunter seemed a good codename. That’s what he was. I led him up here. Murdock used to just be my go-to stop. I didn't have a safe house of my own, I was always one of the ones looking for other Survivors. I was like a middle man with everyone else. When we got here, I was all ready to just leave him here. He had a hunting knife, but he didn’t have a fucking clue what to do with it as a weapon, and the gun only lasts as long as the rounds do. He wouldn’t have any of it. He was pretty useless, but I hated being alone. Figured he could learn, you know?

“And holy hell, he learned. He was a natural—it was kind of weird, honestly. But I figure some people just learn easier than others. So he joined me on my find-others quest, it was fun. For the first time since I got thrown into this hot mess, I could honestly describe something as _fun,_ can you believe it? He was my best friend. It got to the point where we were _unstoppable._  Murdock would tell us that we were like him and his partner, way back when he was a Marine. A well-oiled machine.

“We, uh, we found this kid. A football player, still wearing his jersey. Name on the back said ‘Johnson,’ we called him Tank. I mean, for a sixteen-year-old, this kid was fucking massive. Six and a half feet, two hundred sixty-some odd pounds of pure muscle. He was like a Norse Berserker, no wonder he was a linebacker.

“Couple weeks after we found Tank, there was a sort of ambush. We all got away, but Tank was hurt bad. I thought we were going to have to amputate his arm, bad. It ended up getting infected, gangrene, it was awful. Me and Hunter went to a hospital for some antibiotics, something to at least _try_  to save Tank. He was just a kid. Except, there was another ambush. A worse one, as we were leaving the hospital.”

Zelda stopped, taking a shuddering breath before she could force herself to continue. “It was…There were a lot. More than ten Pawns, and there were only two of us, it…And then there were Brawlers, and they all ganged up on Hunter. He was the one with the medicine. It was all too intentional; they don’t have the cognitive functions required to choose the one with the drugs to attack, that’s how we worked out someone’s giving them orders. He was screaming, begging me for help, and…

“I just ran. I didn’t run back to Tank, either. I just ran, until I got here. I have no idea how long it was before Murdock was able to get me to tell him anything, but once I did, he was really fucking _pissed.”_

“Because you were scared?” Pete cut in. “He was pissed at you because you were outnumbered and scared and you’re actually capable of human emotion and response?”

Patrick hit him, a quick slap upside the head. “Shut up,” he hissed.

“You have to understand, Murdock’s military,” Zelda explained. “You die with your brothers in arms. And even if it wasn’t Hunter he was pissed about, I left a _kid_  alone in a rundown _shack_  with fucking _gangrene._  Never mind I couldn’t save Hunter, I as good as killed Tank.”

“Running from an ambush doesn’t seem all that comparable to leaving Dallon and Brendon for dead in the woods,” Joe pointed out after a moment. “Running is understandable, abandoning is unforgivable.”

Zelda sighed, letting herself sink down so she was sitting on the floor. “Losing Hunter, it…It wasn’t good, for anyone. Least of all me. I couldn’t have done anything, I know that. He was dead whether I went towards him or away.” She took a shaky breath before continuing. “I…I think it was only a couple months, before I found him. It wasn’t very long, at any rate. But we were together for so much longer. So when I lost him, lost him because I didn’t even bother trying to save him…” She shrugged. “I’m sure you guys can all see what it’s done to me, by now. There are a lot of people between Hunter and now, all of them abandoned and left for dead the second they became inconvenient to me. Murdock just used Hunter as the argument because that’s the only one that I care about. Bringing up Hunter will always remind me that leaving all those other people was absolutely awful.”

“You loved him.”

It wasn’t a question, and five pairs of eyes turned to stare at Dallon as if he was the stupidest person in the universe. Maybe he was.

Except, Zelda didn’t lash out. Didn’t snap at him. Didn’t jump to her feet with a knife in her hand. Just let out a breath and said, “Yeah. Yeah, I really did.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Well that was fun, wasn't it?
> 
> I'm pyromanicschizophrenic on tumblr, follow there for updates on the story (and, as soon as I've got time, probably a massive Hamilton spam. Spamilton?)


	14. It's Just a Matter of Time Until We're All Found Out

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> One of my favorite scenes, and one of the funniest exchanges I've ever written lies within.

_Of all of us,_  Patrick thought bitterly, _Pete’s a surprise._

Patrick himself had nowhere near forgiven Zelda for all her wrongdoings over the past few months. As understandable as these new revelations may have been, it didn’t change the fact that she hadn’t given them time to cope, continuously got angry with them for their responses, threatened Pete multiple times, and _would_  have left Dallon and Brendon for dead. Admittedly, he was less inclined to call her the heartless, unfeeling shell he’d accused her of being in the beginning, but knowing about Hunter wasn’t a cure-all.

But he watched Pete watch Zelda, and Pete had that look in his eye that Patrick knew all too well. That look that said, _I get it, it’s okay._  He hadn’t expected for it to be _Pete_  to do the total 180 and forgive Zelda that readily.

Zelda disappeared into her room. After a few seconds, Pete stood up and went into the one he shared with Patrick. Patrick followed.

Pete was already on his cot, slouching and staring at the opposite wall. Patrick sat beside him.

“I keep trying to picture it,” Pete mumbled. Patrick didn’t have to ask for an elaboration. “And I keep imagining if it was Meagan.”

It had been two days, by Patrick’s estimate, since Zelda had told them. Dallon’s head was clearer, Pete’s throat was as good as it was going to get, and Andy’s arm was healing as it should. Patrick could mostly move his shoulder, even if it was a little stiff, and Brendon’s ankle was good enough that he could hide his limp for a couple hours at a time. They were leaving at sundown.

The first time Patrick fell asleep after hearing about Hunter, he had a nightmare. It started out, him and Pete in the middle of a copse of trees, when they were surrounded by _everything_  they’d seen by that point. Pawns, Brawlers, the thing that wanted to eat him and Joe, the Brigade. They surrounded Pete, but when Patrick looked again, it wasn’t Pete getting torn apart.

It was Elisa.

Pete hadn’t asked him what he dreamt about when he woke up screaming. Patrick knew him well enough to know he hadn’t needed to.

“In my head,” Pete continued, “I know that it doesn’t change anything. That her past doesn’t make up for how she’s been treating us. I _know_  that. It’s just…” He trailed off, as if he didn’t know what words came next.

Patrick didn’t try to finish the sentence for him; sometimes Pete had a look about him that said he needed to find the words himself, he was just having trouble with it. For all Pete’s poeticism, for as great as he was at lyrics, he was lost for words a lot.

“If any of us die,” Pete said finally, after a couple minutes of silence. Patrick’s blood turned to ice. “If any of us die out there, everybody else has to keep each other from shutting down.” He didn’t say _we,_ which Patrick knew was his way of distancing himself just enough to finish the thought, but made him think that Pete expected that he’d be the one that died.

“None of us are going to die,” Patrick said instead. He had no way of knowing that, but self-delusion and outright lying to himself were a much better plan than worrying himself to death, especially since they were about to leave.

“We could,” Pete argued dully. “I almost did already.”

“Don’t remind me,” Patrick muttered darkly. “You almost have a lot. Keep antagonizing Zelda and her shiny knife collection.” If there was one upside to Pete’s sudden empathy towards Zelda, it was that he may be slightly less prone to arguing with her every word or action.

“Always have liked shiny things,” Pete joked weakly.

“Yeah, I know.”

* * *

Each bag had a military issue weather coat, some water purifiers, and about twenty MREs, as well as the supplies that they’d managed to grab before the attack. They each had a canteen filled with water and a flashlight, and any weapons lost had been replaced.

“Gonna miss you, Z,” Murdock said, leaning against the door frame. “And all the rest of you.”

Dallon was going to miss Murdock, too, though he didn’t voice it aloud. The other man was absolutely insane, possibly certifiably so, but his sense of humor was neither composed solely of morbid jokes nor forced and weak, which was more than could be said for any of the rest of them. He also had a larger first aid supply, though he’d given them a fair share, and more first aid knowledge than Zelda did (she’d admitted it herself).

“If this works,” Zelda replied, “we should really throw a party.”

“I’ll supply the booze,” Murdock answered with a grin. “When it works.”

Zelda nodded. “When it works.” She turned around and beckoned everyone to start walking. “Towards the setting sun,” she directed. “And just keep going.”

“I don’t like the idea of moving when it’s dark,” Joe said warily, looking around them for any sign of movement.

“It’s too cold to be stationary at night,” Zelda explained. “I don’t like moving when it’s dark either, but I like the idea of freezing to death even less.”

“Do you know if any of them can see in the dark?” Dallon asked, watching the ground in front of him instead of staring right into the sun. He still felt dizzy whenever there was an especially bright light, so maybe if they could just sleep through midday that’d be great. “Because unless you can, I don’t think any of us have night vision.”

“I’ve never had much reason to go out at night,” Zelda admitted, “so I honestly don’t know. Even if they don’t, it doesn’t take much for them to follow flashlights.”

“I’m not stumbling blindly through the dark,” Pete argued immediately. Dallon noticed Patrick close his eyes and take a deep breath.

“Wasn’t suggesting it,” Zelda snapped.

_So much for a couple hours of peace_ , Dallon thought sullenly. _Nice while it lasted._

“Sounded like you were about to,” Pete muttered darkly.

“Pete, if you’re done being suicidal,” Andy interrupted, before Zelda could respond. “I’d really like to make it a few hours before we have to start worrying about your wellbeing.”

“I’m always worrying about his wellbeing,” Patrick pointed out. “He can’t do it himself.”

“Yeah, that’s fair,” Andy allowed. “Regardless, I’d like to make it a few hours before _I_  have to start worrying about his wellbeing.”

“Guys, I’m right here,” Pete objected.

“Yes, you are,” Dallon agreed. “Would you like to tell them that they’re wrong?”

“Yeah, Dallon’s back,” Brendon said with a grin, standing on his toes to prop his elbow on the taller man’s shoulder. “And Patrick and Andy are right, Pete.”

“Oh, ‘cause you’re so much better?” Dallon asked him, shaking the singer’s elbow off. “Both of you are absolutely terrible at worrying about yourselves, leaving me and Patrick to do it for you.”

“Hey, Andy,” Joe asked suddenly. “Will you worry about me if I disregard my own wellbeing?” He fluttered his eyelashes.

“No,” Andy said flatly. “I’ll be cheering when Zelda sticks a knife in your eye.”

“Please,” Zelda muttered. “I’d go for the neck, kill him quickly so his screaming doesn’t attract anything.”

Joe pouted. “You used to love me,” he whined.

Andy snorted. “Who told you that? I didn’t tell you that.”

“Sure you did,” Pete argued. “Way back in the van days. I heard you. You all thought I was sleeping, but I wasn’t. I was awake. Listening. Watching. _Waiting.”_

“Waiting for _what?”_ demanded Patrick. “We were in a fucking van, dude. Nothing was going to happen.”

“Except maybe an explosion,” Joe allowed. “That van was shit.”

“I’d take the shitty van over walking to Kansas,” Brendon piped up. Dallon nodded in agreement.

“Running vehicle would definitely attract unwanted attention,” Zelda pointed out. “And not just from the Big Guys.”

“Who else do we not want attention from?” Dallon asked curiously.

Zelda shrugged. “Imagine you weren’t in DC when you got out,” she explained. “Or we weren’t. Or Pete was smart and didn’t offer you a place in _my_  safehouse.”

“I apologized!” Pete argued.

“And you suddenly saw someone with a working car,” Zelda continued, completely ignoring Pete. “Shelter that moves. You wanna tell me you wouldn’t try and get that car for yourself?”

“They’d have to kill us for it, wouldn’t they?” Joe pointed out. “None of us would kill in the cold blood…Would we?”

The other five shook their heads in agreement. Except, the more Dallon thought about it…

If he and Brendon hadn’t gotten shelter with the Fall Out Boy guys, then they wouldn’t have had anybody to help them get anywhere. And they both almost certainly would have headed straight for California, for their families. California is a long way from Virginia, and a car would have made that journey take less time. And all he really wanted was his family. Even in that moment, surrounded by five of his friends (and Zelda), all he really wanted was Breezy, Amelie, and Knox.

And after long enough with nothing and nobody but Brendon by his side (and maybe not even him), then what would one or two lives really be compared to making sure his wife and kids were okay?

“You would have,” Zelda argued, almost as if she were summing up Dallon’s thoughts herself. “You just wouldn’t have seen it as cold blood. You forget that the only reason you’re still you is because you’ve got each other. You’re keeping each other grounded. If Dallon and Brendon were alone, they would have probably lost themselves a while ago. Or been killed, it’s a toss up.”

“We wouldn’t have lost ourselves,” Brendon argued. “And not just because we still had each other. We still have families to get back to. I think that’s what’s really keeping us grounded, actually.”

Zelda took a deep breath, as if she was deciding on whether or not she should say whatever it is she wanted to say next. Dallon thought it was strange that she was censoring herself now, when she’d never bothered before.

“Don’t say it,” Patrick said suddenly. “Just don’t.”

“I wasn’t going to say there’s no hope,” Zelda said finally. “It’s the only thing that’s got you all willing to go along with me, now, first off. But there’s no less hope for your families and friends than there is for you, and you’ve all managed to make it this long.”

“Yeah, well, much as I hate to admit it, we’ve only managed because of you,” Pete pointed out.

“That must have caused you great pain,” Joe said dryly.

Pete nodded, clutching at his chest. “You have no idea.”

Zelda rolled her eyes. “First, _you’ve_  managed because I need you alive, otherwise you wouldn’t have made it more than a day because I would have killed you. Second, and I’m using Brendon and Dallon as my example here, if the Pawns hadn’t attacked you specifically, just attacked in general, then I think you four could have at least gotten away.”

_“That_  must have caused great pain,” Joe said, sounding slightly awed. Dallon had to admit, he was pretty awed too. If he wasn’t mistaken, Zelda just _complimented_  them.

“I’ll cause you great pain,” Zelda muttered darkly. Dallon would have thought she was joking if a) she hadn’t been threatening all of them since the start, and b) her hand was resting on the handle of one of her knives.

Zelda never did say what she wasn’t sure if she should say, but Dallon wasn’t entirely sure that he wanted to know.

* * *

Almost a week (or maybe a week and a half, Joe was bad at counting) later, and somehow nothing had happened yet. So, stood to reason, it was about time for a disaster.

Joe was on watch, which was a disaster in and of itself, because Joe was truly terrible at keeping watch. It’s not that he was oblivious, or didn’t pay attention, it was just that they were surrounded by trees and he was alone and paranoid and last time he may or may not have woken everyone up for a deer.

(He thought it was a _bear,_ okay?)

But _that,_ that was _not_ a bear (or a deer, alright, jeez). There were voices, first off, and voices that he vaguely recognized. The guttural voice of the thing that had almost _quite literally_  bitten his head off, would have if Patrick hadn’t attacked it from behind. The other voice…

That was the thing that had almost killed Pete.

He’d only heard the Brigade say a single…He supposed it was a word, even if it wasn’t English, but its voice was unmistakable.

“Trohman, if it’s another deer again, I swear—” Pete grumbled, when Joe shook him awake. Joe shushed him quickly, but

“ _Ikh treul?_ ”

Pete sat straight up, eyes zeroing in on the direction that the voice came from. “That’s not a deer,” he breathed.

Joe shook his head. “No,” he agreed, barely above a whisper. “No, it isn’t.” He and Pete woke the others, and of course, Patrick was the hardest to wake up, the fuck.

The singer sat up just as the two things came into view. He looked around at everyone else, weapons drawn and tensed for a fight, and really Joe had to hand it to him—he was up and ready to go faster than the guitarist would have expected.

As a unit, they all moved back, trying to stay hidden from their lines of sight; the problem was that Joe didn’t know what their lines of sight even was, and he was sure that the others didn’t either. Pete was staring at the Brigade, eyes wide and a set to his shoulders that Joe thought was probably more sheer terror than a readiness to try to fight it off again.

“They’re here,” the other thing said, and they really needed to get to work on naming it, whatever it was. “I can smell them. Can’t you?”

“ _Utwe sekhi,_ ” the Brigade responded.

“On my mark,” Zelda whispered, and the only reason that they heard her was because they were all listening as carefully as possible, “tree to tree. That direction.” She pointed to her left, not behind her like Joe felt was safer. But then, they weren’t trying to be _safe,_ they were trying to get to Lebanon. “Move.”

It was slow going. One by one, they had to dart between the trees, only moving if the figures in the distance were looking away. It’s not like Joe could tell anything all that accurately, but it felt as if they only moved a couple feet in ten minutes. Then the figures stopped, and they all froze too.

“I told you they were here.”

“ _Negli ete te._ ”

“Run and hold off a fight as long as possible,” Zelda suggested, “or stand and get it over with.”

Nobody answered, but they all took off running at once, so Joe felt like an answer may have been redundant.

They made it much farther than Joe had expected, given what Pete, Dallon, and Andy had said about the Brigade’s near-teleportation speed. Regardless, they made it to a clearing in the trees before they found it right there in front of them.

Pete, for once in his _life,_ was not the first one to rush in and do something stupid. Instead, he stumbled backwards and tripped, staggering into Patrick, who stepped bravely (stupidly) in front of him. Joe himself was not prepared to die for Pete, considering he honestly felt as if they were all going to die anyway and the order in which they did so was entirely irrelevant.

“I don’t like it when my food runs,” the not-Brigade (fuck it, Joe was calling him Crazy McGee until he got something better) growled from behind them. They were surrounded, even though there were only two. “You can’t escape us. You can’t kill us. Why bother?”

“We’re stupid and stubborn,” Brendon said boldly, Black Widow knife in one hand and a wicked sharp something-or-other the size of his forearm in the other. “Especially him,” he added, nodding towards Pete.

Pete made a half-choked sound that might have been affronted to show that he’d heard, but other than that didn’t argue.

“ _Ke essrel a labishna sen_ ,” hissed the Brigade, and Joe had no clue what that meant, but if the way that Pete and Dallon stiffened was any indication, it didn’t mean anything good.

Crazy McGee grinned; Joe preferred it when it _wasn’t_  doing that, considering the last time he’d seen something like that grin like that, he almost got eaten alive. “Nothing is stopping you, my friend.”

A lot of things happened next, and Joe wasn’t entirely sure what any of those things were. There was a loud cracking sound, a sharp pain in his leg, a lot of screaming from all sides, then his vision was overtaken by red and everything was unbearably hot.

And then everything went black.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Did you think the whole thing was going to be funny? Come on, I'm not _that_ kind.


	15. Behind These Two White Highway Lines

Brendon refused. There was no addition to that sentence, no prepositional phrase, no _refused to…_  He simply refused. All of it.

Everyone else was asleep. Or unconscious, Brendon wasn’t sure which, but he _was_  sure that he wouldn’t be able to handle if any of them were unconscious on top of everything else that was going on.

“I know you’re still awake,” Zelda said suddenly. Brendon heard a shuffle, then felt someone settle down beside him. “You don’t owe me a full explanation. But I need to know if this is going to be a problem, and how big a problem it is going to be.”

“It’s not going to be a problem,” Brendon said quickly. _Bullshit,_ his brain hissed at him. “Everything is fucking _peachy_.”

Zelda didn’t say anything, but Brendon could feel her disbelief as if it was an entirely tangible thing. “I’m sure it is,” she said finally. “How big of a problem would it be if we stayed with him until we hit Lebanon?”

Brendon closed his eyes, not that it made a difference in the pitch black. “We need him,” he acknowledged, finally breaking his refusal. “I know that.” He paused. “You need him.”

“They won’t keep going without you,” Zelda reminded him, knowing immediately what his edit meant. “Pete made that very clear when you and Dallon told them all what I told Dallon.”

So she had heard that, then.

“I won’t give them a choice,” Brendon decided. He wouldn’t. He knew what kind of leverage their families would be for them. They didn’t need Brendon. Didn’t even need Dallon, not that Brendon would let him follow his stupid ass.

“You’ll die out there.” She stated it as a fact, no sign that she actually cared, but the fact that she even brought it up said that she must have cared in some capacity.

Brendon wasn’t sure if it was a good idea to say what he was actually thinking, that he’d rather die than stay with the newest addition to their group. Or, more specifically, rather die than have to _rely_  on the newest addition to their group. Instead, “I didn’t know you cared.”

“They do.”

She was right, of course. They would all find some way to blame themselves; all of them, except the person genuinely at fault, if there was any one person that the blame could be pinned on.

“If I’m going to stay, it’s going to be a problem,” Brendon confirmed finally. “But if we send him away, there will be a bigger problem. Me and him together, we’re the problem. I’m the more disposable, out of the two of us. So I’ll leave.”

“Try to leave before all of them are awake,” Zelda warned, “and I’ll stop you.”

“And after?”

“I won’t need to.”

Brendon listened as she got up and walked away, small steps so as to not accidentally step on anybody else in the dark.

He kept his eyes closed, and must have dozed off at some point, because the next thing he knew, there was a sliver of light that somehow managed to cast itself directly over his eyes.

He blinked them open slowly, only to find that it wasn’t actually a sliver of light at all, it was Pete shining a flashlight in his face.

“He says we’re parked some place safe,” was all he said, before standing up and walking away. Brendon didn’t need Patrick’s uncanny ability to read Pete’s mind to know that he was meant to follow. He did.

Once Pete had led him away from the others, Brendon looked around and took in his surroundings. They appeared to be on another abandoned Interstate, this one just as littered with cars as I-95 had been. Brendon could see their ride, an old eighteen wheeler that _he_  shouldn’t have been able to drive, but somehow was. Honestly, though, it’s not like he really needed to be mindful of the other vehicles on the roads.

“I thought we didn’t want to be driving,” Brendon said finally, ignoring Pete’s scrutinizing gaze. “And I wouldn’t call this _safe_ , by the way, he’s totally lying about—”

“He saved our lives, Brendon,” Pete interrupted. “And I don’t think Zelda really anticipated a semi-truck. We’ll be fine.”

“Until it runs out of gas,” Brendon pointed out petulantly. He wondered if this was the best time to tell Pete that he was going to leave. “Did you talk to him?”

“Did you?” Pete countered. “I heard you and Zelda, at whatever fucking time of day that was.”

“You aren’t going to change my mind,” Brendon snapped. He turned to walk back to the truck, but Pete’s hand on his arm stopped him.

“And you’re not going to change mine. Or any of theirs.” When Brendon didn’t reply, Pete continued, “There are five of us, B. One of you. Tying you up isn’t going to slow us down any, we’ve got a truck now. You wanna tell me how it is you’re going to get away from us?”

“Zelda said I wasn’t leaving before you all woke up,” Brendon pointed out. “She didn’t say I couldn’t leave when you’re all asleep again.”

“You’re better than this, Brendon Urie,” Pete said firmly. “I know you are.”

“Does he?” Brendon snapped.

“Then you'll just have to show him.”

* * *

Dallon didn’t have much of an idea as to what happened in the woods, but he did know that they almost died (in his and Pete’s case, again), but that they _hadn’t_  died. At least, they probably hadn’t, because if they had then the afterlife looked very much like the inside of a tractor trailer on an abandoned interstate. He figured that they all owed their lives to whoever was in possession of this tractor trailer, so he’d have to thank whoever that was.

First, though, he’d have to figure out where Pete and Brendon were, because they were the only two not accounted for in the trailer. Patrick, Joe, and Andy were all still sleeping, and Zelda was staring out the opened door at something Dallon couldn’t see (or something that wasn’t there, it was hard to say). Worry gnawed at his stomach worse for every second he couldn’t find them.

“They’re okay,” Zelda said suddenly. “They stepped out to talk for a second. They’ll be back.” She stood up and hopped out of the trailer. “Stay awake until they come back. If the others wake up, tell them the same.” She didn’t explain before she turned out of his line of sight, leaving Dallon blinking in confusion.

“ _Ow_ , fuck,” muttered Joe suddenly. “ _Fuck_ ,” he repeated. Dallon glanced over, seeing for the first time the splint on his knee and the nasty scratch on his side; the other man wasn’t wearing a shirt. “Wha’ happen’?” Joe mumbled, shielding his eyes from the weak sun filtering in.

“Don’t know,” Dallon admitted. He honestly had half a mind to hop out of the trailer and find Brendon and Pete himself. “Zelda didn’t say.”

“Fuck,” Joe said again. Dallon watched as he tried to push himself into a seated position, but gave up and lied back down. “Wait…” Joe looked around the trailer, eyes widening after a moment. “Where are—”

“Went out to talk, apparently,” Dallon said, trying to calm him down before he injured himself further. “I don’t know about what.”

“But they’re okay?”Joe asked, relaxing into the floor of the trailer.

Dallon shrugged. “According to Zelda, yeah.” It went unsaid that Zelda’s word was hardly gospel, and that he wouldn’t believe that Brendon was okay until he saw it for himself. Looking at Joe showed that the guitarist felt the same about Pete. “She also told me not to go back to sleep until they came back.”

“Which suggests that there’s a high chance that they might come back hurt,” Joe declared. “I’m going to go look for them.”

Dallon held out a hand to stop him, Joe’s face pinched in pain as he struggled to sit up. “I’ll go,” he volunteered. “You should rest up for when this truck inevitably breaks down and we all have to walk again.”

Joe shot Dallon a thumbs up. “Roger that.” A pause, then, “Should I still try to stay awake?”

Dallon shrugged. “Probably.” He stood up and hopped out of the trailer, looking up at the pale gray sky. He couldn’t tell if it was early morning or late evening because he couldn’t see the sun. He felt like it might rain later, because that’s just what they all needed in that moment. A storm.

“…supposed to just pretend that he didn’t do any of that?”

That was Brendon’s voice. Dallon recognized that tone; it wasn’t antagonistic for the sake of being antagonistic, like Brendon usually was when talking to or about Zelda. It wasn’t even antagonistic, really, more defeated and resolute but also defiant all at once. It was a tone of voice that Brendon only ever used when talking about one person.

“I’m _saying_ ,” that was Pete, sounding scared but determined nonetheless, and Dallon was suddenly extremely confused, “that you need to set all of that aside for until we’ve fixed the world.”

“Like you’ve been doing with Zelda?” Brendon demanded.

“I’m still _with_  Zelda, aren’t I?” Pete shot back. Dallon rounded the side of the trailer, bringing the other two men into his view. Brendon’s back was to him, with Pete facing him, and Dallon could pinpoint the exact moment that he was noticed because the shorter man’s expression changed from worried to vindictive as he added, “Not threatening to _leave_  by _myself_  like you are.”

“ _What_?” Dallon all but shouted, without actually thinking. Brendon spun around so fast that he unbalanced himself, stumbling backwards into Pete, who sidestepped and let Brendon fall on his ass. “Brendon, you can’t—”

“Fuck off,” Brendon practically growled, clambering gracelessly to his feet. “Everyone can stop telling me what to do. I’m not a child, I can make my own decisions.”

Pete scoffed. “‘Not a child,’” he repeated. “You want to go off, on your own, in the apocalypse, where you _know_  you’ll die in like, an hour tops, all because you don’t want to deal with—”

“I can survive more than an hour,” Brendon argued hotly. Dallon wasn’t so sure about that; something about the way he was holding himself suggested that the recent attack had left him with an injury that wasn’t quite as obvious as Joe’s were.

“I’m sure,” Pete agreed dryly. “Except for the part where we’ll find you before you make it a mile, and we’ll tear you apart ourselves. Right Dallon?”

Probably not, Dallon allowed, but he wasn’t about to disagree with Pete when he was desperately trying to make Brendon see what an idiot he was being. “Maybe Zelda will even give us pointers,” he added, surprised by how venomous his voice sounded. Maybe Pete was right, and he would help tear into Brendon. “I’m sure she knows the best ways to dismember somebody.”

Brendon glared at them, but he didn't say anything else. Just huffed and stalked past Dallon, hopping back into the trailer.

“We’ll need to keep an eye on him,” Pete said after a moment. “He’s serious, Dallon. He wants to leave.”

Dallon blinked in confusion. “But _why_?” They were all staying together, and they were all staying with Zelda, because together with Zelda was the most guaranteed way to get home to their families. What could possibly have been so bad that Brendon was willing to change his mind?

* * *

“Oh, things just got way more interesting.” Zelda felt like the main reason Pete was talking to Brendon there was because they were much more likely to be stumbled upon by the others when they woke up, so they were more likely to be overheard. Zelda saw Dallon before he made himself known to Pete, but she figured that he’d probably learned his lesson in lurking well enough that he’d join the conversation sooner rather than later.

“Still don’t see the appeal in watching Pete Wentz and Brendon Urie argue if you can’t hear what they’re arguing about,” said the man beside her, distractedly trying to figure something out on the big paper map that she couldn’t figure out the origins of. He hadn’t given her a name yet, so she was half-inclined to give him one, but also knew that the way Brendon was acting meant she’d get a name soon.

“I know what they’re arguing about,” Zelda pointed out. “And while I don’t care about who wins, I do care about the fact that literally everyone else cares. And if Brendon gets his way it’ll be a massive setback in my plans.”

“So tell him that his way makes your job easier,” the man suggested. “He’ll do exactly what you want.”

“Or let Dallon find out what Brendon wants to do,” Zelda suggested, which must have been exactly what Pete did, because down on the ground, Brendon was stumbling to the ground as Dallon looked down at him with a mixture of fear, concern, shock, and flat out anger. Anger was not a look that Zelda was used to on Dallon’s face, and she was glad it was pointed at Brendon because that meant it’d be put to good use. “Besides, everyone else has already made it clear to him that they will make my job harder. So I’d be lying and then lose even _more_  of their trust.”

“Their trust must be nice,” he replied. Zelda thought it sounded almost wistful.

Zelda watched as Brendon stalked away from the bassists and out of her line of sight fro the trailer. “So how do you two know each other, and why is Brendon being a fucking idiot because you showed up?”

The man snorted, folding up his paper map and placing it on the dashboard. “Brendon is a fucking idiot,” he countered. “This isn't my fault.”

“More of an idiot than usual,” Zelda amended. “Because he’s officially surpassed Wentz on the stupidity scale.”

The man shrugged. “Then it’s his fault,” he decided. “I’m not taking the blame for this.”

Zelda narrowed her eyes suspiciously. “Are you at least going to give me something to call you?” she asked after a moment.

He looked over at her and shrugged. “I’m sure Brendon will give you something.”

* * *

It had happened like this: the Brigade and the other thing ( _He_  had called it a Shepherd) had them cornered. To an outsider who didn’t know what either of those things were, it wouldn’t have looked like they were cornered. There were seven of them and only two enemies. But because the Brigade was indestructible, could practically teleport, and was inhumanly strong all at once, and the Shepherd appeared also indestructible and also wanted to eat them, they may as well have been outnumbered.

When the Brigade finally attacked, it launched itself straight for Joe. Andy tried to pull it off, and he kind of succeeded, but he also may have accidentally broken Joe’s leg in the process (Andy had since apologized profusely for doing so, to which Joe waved him off the first time and grew steadily agitated every time after). The Shepherd, meanwhile, launched itself right for Dallon, which seemed like a strange choice, given that Dallon and Brendon were really only a target because they were with Fall Out Boy. Pete and Brendon were able to hold the Shepherd off for long enough that Dallon was able to stagger backwards and collect himself, before launching himself directly at the Shepherd to try and get one of its limbs off. The Shepherd, however, sidestepped, and Dallon overshot and ran face first into a tree.

Patrick made sure that Dallon’s concussion wasn’t back, and also that his now bloody nose wouldn’t end up bleeding so bad that Dallon passed out from blood loss (because wouldn’t that be the way to go, running into a tree in an attack and bleeding to death from the resulting nosebleed), but then Patrick found himself pinned up against a tree, the Brigade choking him. Patrick saw the twisted irony more than he saw that he was about to die, and he was very glad once they were safe that his dying thought was not _well that fucking figures._

Or, more likely, _Pete what the fuck_ , because right as Patrick’s vision started to spot and blacken at the edges, Pete had bodily launched himself at the Brigade and was trying to pull it away from Patrick, and of course Patrick’s last thought was almost scolding Pete for trying to save him.

The Brigade managed to fling Pete off of him, but Patrick had already recovered enough to be able to take the fight away from where Dallon was trying to see through the pain of a probably broken nose. Pete flew backwards, crashing into Joe and Andy, his knife catching on Joe’s side (another thing that the guitarist was apologized to profusely; Joe was just irate that both of his injuries had come from his teammates trying to save each other).

There was a fire, then, licking away at some of the trees, and that’s about where Joe and Dallon both passed out, leaving everyone else to carry them out to where their savior was waiting with a massive Walmart eighteen wheeler, still holding the zippo lighter in his hands, twisting it around expertly with his thin fingers. Brendon, Patrick, Pete, and Andy all stared at him at shock, but he looked directly at Zelda, probably because she was the only one he didn’t know.

“Need a lift anywhere?” he asked, and if Brendon hadn’t known any better he’d have said it was out of the kindness of his heart.

Zelda just glanced backward at the now-raging forest fire. “Anywhere but here.”

It was as he was watching them stitch Joe’s side and splint his leg, watching _him_  take care of Dallon’s definitely broken nose, that Brendon made his decision.

His decision being that he’d rather be anywhere else than stuck in a Walmart truck with _Ryan fucking Ross._

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Literally the most predictable twist ending ever. I'll get better at plot twists, I'm sure.


	16. Ex-Friends To the End

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> For anyone who was wondering, the reason I bothered to pretend to make Ryan a twist ending (because honestly, who DIDN'T see that coming?) was because when I first decided to bring him in, I wanted it to be the end of the chapter. But then I wrote out the attack and I really liked the way I ended that one so I was just like, eh.

Joe couldn’t stop staring. It wasn’t for lack of trying, he just couldn’t believe his eyes. There was a massive Walmart truck just sitting in the middle of an Interstate, surrounded by other cars, and they were just sitting on the asphalt eating their MREs. And sitting on _top_  of that Walmart truck, also eating an MRE but looking like he’d rather starve (Joe could relate), was _Ryan Ross._

According to Andy, Ryan Ross had showed up with a Walmart truck, started a forest fire, and saved their asses. It wasn’t that Joe thought Andy was lying, just that maybe they’d all died and were all stuck in Limbo forever. That seemed much more logical than Ryan Ross ex machina.

“Why’s Ryan on top of the truck?” Patrick asked finally, breaking the awkward tension that had settled over the group. Zelda was in the cab, claiming that she wasn’t hungry, so it was just the six of them. Joe shrugged.

“I dunno.”

“Keeping watch, probably,” Andy supplied. Brendon glared at all three of them in turn.

“He’s a coward,” Brendon spat. “Doesn’t want to sit down here and join us.”

Pete punched him in the arm. It could have been mistaken for friendly if Joe couldn’t see exactly how much Brendon recoiled. “You have no right,” he snapped.

“Hey, Ryan,” Pete called, ignoring the cold glare that Brendon shot him. Joe didn't think he’d ever seen Brendon look so calmly pissed off, that was really more Patrick’s thing. “Why are you on top of the truck?”

Ryan ignored him. Brendon scoffed. “See? Coward.”

Pete punched him again.

Joe didn’t know exactly what Pete and Brendon had been talking about early that morning, because neither of them (or Dallon) had been in the right headspace to supply the words, but Joe knew that they had been arguing, and that Pete and Dallon had told all of them not to let Brendon out of their sight (Joe was not allowed to be the only one watching Brendon; he took offense).

“I’m not a _coward_ ,” Brendon argued. “I’m not scared to talk to him.”

“Oh, cool, we’ll organize a meeting,” Dallon interrupted scathingly. That made Joe extremely confused, and he could tell that Patrick and Andy were too.

“I’m not _scared_ ,” Brendon repeated. “I just don’t want to talk to him.”

“Why not?” Joe asked. It’s wasn’t that he thought Brendon was scared, mainly because he didn’t actually know exactly what was going on and Brendon really just looked irreparably pissed, but he was curious.

“Would you?” Brendon shot back.

“No,” Andy agreed. “I’d be terrified to.”

Brendon’s face took on a hunted look. “I see.” He clenched his jaw. “I’m not scared of Ryan,” he repeated, starting to sound like a broken record.

“At least I can admit I’m being a coward,” Ryan called down suddenly. Six pairs of eyes shot up to where he sat on top of the truck. He shrugged, crumpling up all the waste from his MRE. “There are literally no sounds other than your conversation,” he pointed out. “I can hear you.” He stood up and hopped down off the truck, rolling neatly to his feet as he hit the ground. Joe had to admit, he was impressed with how much Ross had changed. “Either you’re scared or petty, and I honestly doubt that second one, even from  _you_.”  
Joe wondered how much the compliment must have hurt, no matter how backhanded it may have been.

Brendon shot to his feet. “I’m not _scared_  of you, Ross,” he snapped. “But if you think that I am willing to put up with you all the way to Kansas, you’re fucking _insane_.”

“Nobody’s _asking_  you to,” Ryan snapped back.

“I am,” Pete interjected.

“ _Shut up Pete,_ ” snapped both of them.

“You can stay in the trailer,” Ryan continued fiercely, “and I’ll stay in the cab. We never have to see each other, and you can pretend you’re in a magical moving truck until we get there, and then that magical moving truck will drive away and we’ll never have to see each other again.”

“And why do you care so much?” Brendon demanded. “Why’s it matter to you whether I stay or go?”

“I don’t,” Ryan said brazenly. “But if you go off and get yourself killed, which you will, then they’ll all go off after you and get themselves killed. And that leaves me to go all the way back to LA, which I’d rather not do under _any_  circumstance, and tell Sarah, who I’d rather not _see_  under any circumstance, that her husband was torn apart by nightmarish creatures because he was too much of a coward to swallow his pride and act like an adult.”

Brendon recoiled, looking suddenly so _young_  that Joe’s heart just went out to him. Ryan, meanwhile, turned around and walked up to the front of the truck and climbed into the cab.

“Oh, by the way,” Pete said into the heavy silence that had settled over them, “Brendon wants to go off and get himself killed because he doesn’t want to be an adult and deal with Ryan.”

That, Joe felt, went without saying.

Brendon mumbled something before climbing into the back of the truck.

* * *

The weirdest thing about it, Ryan thought, as he told Zelda to tell everyone to get in the back because they were about to set off, was that Pete and Dallon both appeared to be on his side. Patrick seemed willing to give him a second chance, which wasn’t too unexpected but still a pleasant surprise, and Andy and Joe just didn’t seem to care about what he’d done in the past, only what he’d do in the coming future. It was only Brendon that seemed so angry at him that he refused to stay in the same group as him.

“So I hear you saved our asses.”

Ryan looked up sharply when he heard Joe’s voice rather than Zelda’s, seeing the wild-haired guitarist trying to hop into the cab with a broken leg. “You should stay in the trailer,” Ryan insisted dumbly, mainly because he was not looking forward to hours of driving with anyone who actually _knew_  about what he’d done, but also because Joe was going to have a hell of a time getting in and out of the cab.

“Everybody’s more comfortable with me in a secured seat,” Joe explained, finally managing to haul himself up. His face was completely white, but other than that he did a good job of masking the pain. Ryan couldn’t help but feel like the explanation was a lie, but he wasn’t about to make Joe try to figure out how to get back out of the cab. “Anyway, saving our asses. Thanks for that.”

“Yeah,” Ryan said distractedly. “Yeah, no uh…No problem.” This was off to a fantastic start.

Joe, to his credit, seemed to sense Ryan’s awkwardness, and so didn’t say anything as Ryan started up the truck and got it moving, maneuvering around the broken-down cars littering the highway.

“How’d you learn to drive this thing?” Joe asked after a few minutes of watching the scenery go by.

Ryan shrugged. “Just figured it out, to be honest. It’s not too difficult, it just took some getting used to.” He could get behind this small talk thing, this not talking about Brendon thing. “The worst is getting gas. It runs on diesel, and all the cars don’t.” But there was a stack of gas cans sitting in the back, most of them full of diesel fuel that he could use in an emergency.

“I see you’ve managed just fine,” Joe noted.

There was silence in the cab again, nothing but aging mile markers and exit signs painted over with graffiti passing by outside the windows. “How do you know how to get to Kansas?” Joe asked finally.

“Just head east, mostly,” Ryan admitted. “You can read some of these signs if you try hard enough, so they’ll clue me in enough.” He laughed humorlessly. “Of fucking course you’re all going to Kansas,” he added in an undertone.

Joe’s brow furrowed in confusion. “Do you know what’s waiting for us?”

Ryan shook his head. “I don’t have a clue,” he assured him. “Not one. But I know that everything within a hundred-mile radius of Lebanon is chaos. You’re going into the heart of the apocalypse.”

“We,” Joe corrected. “You’re going there with us.”

“God help me,” Ryan muttered.

“Why?” Joe asked, finally reaching one of the subjects Ryan was hoping they could avoid. “Why are you helping us?”

“Honestly, I don’t know,” Ryan admitted. “Because I’m crazy? Suicidal? I can’t figure it out. I waited for you all to come out of the woods because I always do, especially when it’s the Shepherds and the Brigade that I’m burning down. Making sure that everyone coming out will be able to get back on their feet. And then Zelda said ‘can you take us to Lebanon’ and I should have said no.” But he couldn’t. His brain had laughed harshly and said _fuck no_  but his mouth hadn’t gotten that signal and had said instead _yeah sure okay._

A traitorous part of his brain insisted it was because he couldn’t leave Brendon for dead, no matter how much he may have been tempted, just like the traitorous part of his brain said that he _would_  have gone to Sarah, even when the rest of his brain insisted that it was just something he said to put Brendon in his place.

Even after all this time, there was some part of him that couldn’t stand to see Brendon suffer, no matter how much the rest of him was begging for it. And that tiny part that was still a decent human being was the dominant part.

“I guess, maybe I like the idea of ending the apocalypse,” Ryan added, deciding to leave his head and give Joe a better answer.

“Ending the apocalypse does sound really good,” Joe agreed. “So thanks for being able to prioritize that, I guess.”

“Yeah,” Ryan said. “Yeah.”

* * *

Andy wasn’t one to shun a man because of something he didn’t have all sides of the story to. He was the kind to learn all sides of the story before making his judgement, and even then it usually wasn’t of the ‘shun them’ variety.

Granted, Andy already knew Brendon’s side of the story. Maybe not Ryan’s full side, but definitely Brendon’s. Andy knew that words were said back in 2009, words that couldn’t be forgiven easily (Spencer had told him what those words _were_ ); and Andy could admit that he had tougher skin than Brendon, especially Brendon back then, but what Spencer had said that _Ryan_  had said was not, under any circumstance, bad enough for Brendon to be willing to die.

But looking at Brendon, sitting in the corner of the trailer with his knees drawn up, Andy remembered why he usually didn’t shun people. So while Pete and Patrick were talking quietly as far from Brendon as they could possibly get, and Dallon was dozing near them, and Zelda was sitting dead center working something out with a pencil and multiple sheets of old paper, Andy got up and carefully made his way over to Brendon and sat down next to him, knocking shoulders.

“Leave me alone,” Brendon requested, voice muffled from where his face was buried in his arms and knees.

“Okay,” Andy agreed, not moving but not saying anything else, either. It was something he used to do with Pete, before they had Patrick around to break down his walls with just a few words and a well placed glare. It was his way of saying _I’m here, when you change your mind._

“Why’s he doing this?” Brendon asked finally, so quietly that even in the near-silence of the trailer, Andy had to strain his ears to hear him. He knew that it was because Brendon didn’t want to be heard by the others.

“I don’t know,” Andy admitted, thinking about it. It was strange, admittedly. He didn’t think Ryan was as bad a person as Brendon was clearly trying to remember him as, just that not even Andy would be willing to go straight towards the suspected center of the apocalypse for any reason if he didn’t absolutely _have_  to (which, unfortunately, he did).

“Why’d he even bother to save us?” Brendon continued, as if Andy hadn’t answered (which, admittedly, he hadn’t really).

“Maybe he didn’t know it was us,” Andy suggested. “Or maybe he’s plugged in to that network of Survivors Murdock mentioned. The fact that we’re trying to stop the apocalypse seems like the kind of thing the network would have been made aware of.”

“I don’t want to be here anymore.”

Andy looked up at the other three, Pete and Patrick obviously and blatantly ignoring Brendon. He thought they were doing more harm than good, if the ultimate goal was keeping Brendon in the group with them. He understood that they were all angry; hell, he was too, but at least he wasn’t pushing Brendon even further away.

“Honestly, I can’t say I blame you,” Andy said, more thinking aloud than anything else.

Brendon glanced up at him sharply. “You…You don’t?”

“I…No. No, I don’t.” He let his voice rise a bit, so that he could be heard from across the trailer, but still letting it be conversational. “I did, at first, because Ryan alone isn’t worth running off into inevitable death.”

“I’m not _that_  helpless,” Brendon objected.

“But now, instead of trying to convince you that you can ignore him, at least, everybody else is ignoring _you_ ,” Andy continued, pretending Brendon hadn’t spoken because yes, he is that helpless, and yes, he would be dead in a week. Even if he managed to evade all the monsters, he’d still starve to death.

He noticed Pete and Patrick shift guiltily, and even Dallon stirred a bit, making Andy suspect that he wasn’t even sleeping, just pretending for a reason not to have to talk to Brendon.  
“I wouldn’t want to stay if everybody else was making me feel unwelcome, either,” Andy finished. “That’s what I’m saying.”

Brendon didn’t say anything, but he did smile up at Andy, a silent _thank you_  as clear as if he’d said it aloud.

“Oh, don’t thank me yet,” Andy added. “I’m still pissed that you’d rather run off to die than deal with your problems, but because I _don’t_  want you to run off to die, I’m still talking to you. I just wanted them to see how dumb they were being.”

“You should probably talk to him, honestly,” Zelda added, because obviously she was listening the whole time.

Brendon scowled. “I’ll stay,” he agreed sullenly, “but I’m not talking to him.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I loved the bit with Andy at the end. That part was fun.
> 
> pyromanicschizophrenic.tumblr.com


	17. The Calm Before the Storm Set it Off (and the Sun Burnt Out Tonight)

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> An important reveal finally made.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So I'm going to say this now instead of at the end like I usually do: 
> 
> I'm moving this week, so if there's any problem with me not getting chapters written then I'll be sure to let you know. I update through my tumblr at pyromanicschizophrenic.tumblr.com, so if you want to know of any delays in coming chapters, that's where you'll find out. Otherwise, just assume if a chapter's late it's because I haven't had time to finish it yet.
> 
> On another note, I love you guys. I've told you that, right?

Pros of Ryan Ross and his Walmart truck: they were safe and moving quickly, Brendon wasn’t exactly able to run off on his own into the apocalyptic wilderness and _die_ , they were all sheltered from the wind.

Cons of Ryan Ross and his Walmart truck: there was absolutely no concept of time, it was actually incredibly boring (not that Patrick objected to the rest of the trip being uneventful, it just wasn’t fun sitting in a dark trailer for hours at a time, with only brief interludes for food before another few hours of sitting in a dark trailer for hours at a time), Ryan Ross and his Walmart truck were the reason Brendon _wanted_  to run off on his own into the apocalyptic wilderness and die.

After Andy had used his power of not-so-subtly telling people they were being fucking assholes on Pete, Patrick, and Dallon, they’d all stopped ignoring and avoiding Brendon. They’d taken to rotating out sitting up in the cab with Ryan. Patrick thought this was maybe an unspoken but unanimously-agreed-to strategy to prove to Brendon that he was the only one who refused to put the past behind him. Granted, Ryan disproved of this strategy almost as much as Brendon seemed to, because he seemed perfectly content just riding by himself in the cab and also didn’t seem to want to talk to Brendon any more than Brendon wanted to talk to him, but nobody else cared about that part.

They’d also taken to asking Ryan to join their circle whenever they stopped to eat, which Ryan had always refused in favor of keeping watch on top of the truck, until Zelda beat him to the top of the truck one day and practically forced him to join them.

Brendon started sitting a little bit off, not leaving their line of sight but sitting far enough away that it was clear he wasn’t happy with this new development.

“You all do realize that this game of yours won’t make me and Brendon want to talk to each other, right?” Ryan asked Patrick, one of his days in the cab.

Patrick shrugged. “Maybe not, but trying gives us something to do until we get to Kansas.”

“To each his own, I guess,” Ryan muttered, changing lanes to avoid crushing a white sedan.

Ryan didn't say another word until they stopped. Patrick didn’t press.

When they did stop, it was a sharp and sudden press of the brakes, with Ryan swearing colorfully under his breath.

Patrick had been lost in thought (about Elisa, about Declan, about Pete, about Brendon), and looked up at Ryan sharply as he was thrown forward, having to throw up his arms to make sure he didn’t collide with the dashboard.

“Ryan, what the fuck?”

Ryan was staring straight ahead, face pale and eyes wide. “I think,” he said, licking his lips nervously, “we might be here.”

Patrick looked up front. In front of them was a pile-up of cars; there must have been twenty of them at least. A wide variety of models and colors, it looked less like an accident and more like a deliberate barricade. Something designed specifically to halt someone coming in that way—like them.

“I don’t…” he started, but Ryan shushed him.

“I’m going to count to three,” he said, in a deadly calm voice, “and we are going to get out of the cab and sprint for the back. If we’re lucky, it’ll already be open.”

Patrick nodded as Ryan started counting. He stumbled getting out of the cab, feeling his ankles twinge with the force with which he hit the ground, but he ignored it to run for the back.

“What the fuck was that, Ross?” Pete demanded, as soon as they got to the door, which was just barely open. Patrick and Ryan crawled in, and Ryan pulled the door down, breathing heavily.

“I want total silence in this trailer,” he said, voice barely above a whisper. “And I mean _t_ _otal_  silence.”

In the low light cast from the camping lantern somebody had hung from the ceiling of the trailer, Patrick saw Brendon open his mouth, probably to argue, when suddenly there was a loud banging all around the trailer. Brendon shut his mouth immediately.

The banging continued, and the lantern shook around uncontrollably. Patrick wouldn’t have been surprised if it fell to the ground, though he would probably curse aloud (right before he died along with everybody else). Looking around, everybody except for Zelda and Ryan looked visibly scared. Brendon looked young and vulnerable, and Pete just looked so scared in a way that Patrick hadn’t seen in _years_. He didn’t like that he was seeing it now.

Zelda, while everyone else was silently panicking in their own ways, stood slowly and deliberately, drawing her katana off her back and a long serrated knife from her boot in total silence. Ryan stood too, and Patrick finally saw what sort of weapons he carried on his person—a deadly sharp knife the size of his forearm that had been strapped to Ryan’s leg underneath his jeans. Everyone else drew their various weapons, as well, though considerably more shakily and with a bit more rustling than Zelda and Ryan had.

Just as suddenly as it had started, the banging stopped. Everybody was silent for a tense few seconds before Dallon breathed out shakily, “They’ve stopped,” sounding like he couldn’t believe it.

“Or,” Ryan said, just as near-silently, “it’s gotten in.”

And the door ripped open.

* * *

Pete didn’t know what was meant to happen next. He knew there was going to be a fight as soon as something had started banging on and _shaking_  the trailer they were in, and that feeling of dread and uncertainty grew exponentially as the door was literally _torn apart._

But there was nothing standing there. All that Pete could see through the shredded metal was an empty interstate and a clear blue sky with weak summer sun shining on the asphalt.

It felt like a trap.

“Should we…run?” Andy suggested after a moment of collectively staring out at the empty road.

“You want to go out where there’s something that can do _that_?” Brendon demanded, pointing at the remains of the door.

“Andy’s right,” Ryan said after a moment. Brendon looked like he was about to argue, but Ryan continued over him. “Door’s not protecting anyone anymore. We’re boxed in here.”

“There has to be an ambush waiting for us out there,” Joe pointed out, the only one not standing.

_Why aren’t they just coming in?_  Pete asked himself silently. He wasn’t about to ask it aloud, because that was guaranteed to bring hell itself into the trailer, and he was enjoying not being actively attacked just yet.

“I’d rather be boxed in than try to run and carry him at the same time,” Zelda pointed out, pointing over at Joe. “Depending on what’s out there, we may be able to fight.”

Ryan shook his head, and Pete could see that even Patrick looked doubtful. “I have encountered at least one of the things out there exactly one other time. We’re dead in here or out there. It’s just playing games with us now.”

“You are wrong. I am following my Master’s orders.”

The entire group whipped around, staring at the one who’d spoken—a girl, probably about fourteen or fifteen, with dark brown hair pulled loosely back into a ponytail. Pete couldn’t see her face well, because she was in the back corner of the trailer and obscured by shadows, but he doubted she was any more human than anything else that had attacked them.

“And what orders are those?” Andy asked. Pete was thankful that Andy was good at playing calm, even when absolutely terrified.

“My Master has ordered me to bring you all to him.” She had a blank way of speaking, and Pete’s first thought was _mind control_  or _hypnosis_. It made him actually hope that she _wasn't_  human, because a fourteen-year-old under mind control to help some kind of demon or whoever end the world really was too much.

“And if we refuse?” Zelda demanded.

“Failure to comply will result in the use of force.” She sounded like she was reading from a script without actually _reading_  it, Pete realized. Again, his mind supplied him with _hypnosis_.

Ryan glanced back towards the shredded door. “You did want to find out who’s behind all this,” he reminded them.

“Yes, thank you, Ryan,” Brendon snapped. Ryan shrugged.

Pete looked around at everybody, then back at the girl. He still wasn’t sure how she’d gotten into the trailer in the first place, but there was clearly some kind of teleportation/superhuman speed involved. Not to mention the state of the door, which she was either responsible for herself or in charge of the thing that was. Whether she had them killed or just restrained, if they tried to fight they’d lose.

But if they made it to whoever was in charge of this girl, if they made it to the thing behind the apocalypse, they were definitely dead. There was no way around that, they were very much going to be killed once they got to the epicenter of everything. So the question was, die fighting or die in complacency?

“What happens when we get to your…your Master?” Patrick asked, although Pete could tell that he already knew what the answer was.

“You will die.” She paused. “I would offer comforts of mercy and swift death, but that would be a lie. It will be drawn out and painful with your cooperation or without.”

Pete really hated being threatened by the age-equivalent of a high school freshman. He hated the fact that he was genuinely afraid of her even more.

“Then why should we make it easy for you?” he asked. “If either way we’re going to die a painful death?”

“Because you are curious,” the girl replied simply. “You wish to know who is responsible for the world ending. For the deaths of your friends, the possible deaths of your families, the near deaths of yourselves. You are curious, and so you will come with me.”

Joe shrugged from his spot on the ground. “She’s got us there.”

* * *

Brendon had been enjoying the avoidance of Ryan Ross. Sure, he had been furious when everybody else seemed determined to force him to talk to him, especially when it led to Ryan joining their group for meals, but Brendon could handle not eating with the rest of the group so long as he was still able to be with them in the back of the truck—where Ryan was _not_ , because Ryan was _always_  driving the truck. It was a nice arrangement that Brendon would have been perfectly okay with until the world was better and he was back home with Sarah and their dogs.

Now, though, they were all walking together, following a brainwashed-sounding kid who may or may not have been human through the Kansas wilderness, and because all of Brendon’s so-called _friends_  were bound and determined to force him to talk to Ryan, they were constantly shifting themselves around so that they were both next to each other and walking along tensely.

Really, Brendon felt like even if they were going to talk, that there was a much better time and place to do so then the Kansas wilderness with a brainwashed maybe-not-human kid.

(Alternatively, there really was no better time to make up then on a march to their deaths, but damn it Brendon was stubborn.)

“I don’t really think you’re a bad songwriter,” Ryan said suddenly.

Brendon blinked up at him. “What?” he asked dumbly.

Ryan shrugged. “We’re about to die,” he explained. “And I didn’t want you to die thinking I thought you were a bad songwriter.”

Brendon scowled. “It doesn’t matter,” he said stiffly, looking straight ahead of him. “My last album did better than any of the ones you wrote.”

Ryan shrugged again. “Then maybe I didn’t want you to die thinking I was wrong.” Brendon didn’t answer, so Ryan added, “Or maybe I didn’t want to die without apologizing.”

Brendon turned his head sharply to look up at him. “What was that?”

“I’m sorry.” Ryan took a deep breath. “I had these delusions of grandeur when we were kids, we all knew that. Pete comes in and makes me think that all of that could happen, I let it go to my head.”

“Don’t blame me for your fuck up, Ross,” Pete called back. Ryan ignored him.

“All of _Fever_ , you were just so glad to be there, Brent was fucking off anyway, and Spencer was just so happy to see _me_  so happy, that all three of you let _Fever_  be mine. But then _Pretty. Odd._  happened and we had Jon and none of you were willing to let me take full control again and you and Spence wanted to take everything in a completely different direction than what Jon and I wanted, and I was so _frustrated_  because why weren’t you listening to me like you did before? Why weren’t you just letting me do whatever I wanted and just going along with it?

“I thought that if I told you that you were a terrible songwriter that you’d listen to me, that you’d let me take the reigns back and then I could do whatever I wanted again. I realized at about the time that _Vices and Virtues_  dropped that I…I fucked up, that I should have helped you on your new sound instead of fighting you tooth and nail every step of the way. And maybe it wouldn’t have done as well, maybe it would have done so much better, but I’d have been happier, Spencer would have been happier, and I’m hoping you would have been happier too.” Ryan shrugged again. “Basically, I fucked up something good and I’m sorry about it.”

Brendon stared up at Ryan, utterly gobsmacked. He hadn’t been expecting any apology at all, hadn’t thought that Ryan would be a big enough person to admit he was wrong, and certainly hadn't expected Ryan to be admitting that he realized he was wrong so long ago.

Brendon had been so sure that he hated Ryan Ross, and would until the day he died. But here he was, about to die, and he realized that maybe he didn’t hate Ryan Ross as much as he thought he did.

“If we manage to make it out of this,” Brendon started, “me and Dallon are kind of down a guitarist?”

Ryan nodded. “If we manage to make it out of this, I’ll think about it.”

* * *

Dallon was starting to get tired. By his estimate, judging from what little he could see of the sky this deep into the Midwestern woods, it was sometime in the middle of the night. They’d been walking since about midday, they’d left all their supplies back in the truck because the weird girl they were following refused them the rights to grab them, and he was currently the one helping support Joe’s weight. He doubted they were going to be allowed to sit down and rest for the night, so they were stuck moving forward until they were killed.

“There is a convoy up ahead,” the girl announced. “We will catch a ride with them to my Master.”

Much as Dallon was opposed to accepting a ride from the enemy, he had to admit that it’d be nice to sit for a while. At least he’d be comfortable in his last moments of freedom before he was handed over to this girl’s master to be brutally ripped apart. It was kind of them, really.

Dallon glanced back at Brendon, who was still walking beside Ryan, but they both looked much less tense and upset with each other than they had when they all left. Dallon hadn’t heard what Ryan had said to Brendon, but he was glad that they weren’t about to die on bad terms.

After what may have been another twenty minutes of walking, with Joe struggling to stay awake enough that he wasn’t dead weight and Dallon trying not to collapse from exhaustion, they all came upon a small clearing with six ATVs and another girl—identical to the one leading them—standing guard in front of them.

“You will remain behind me,” the new girl said, “and in front of her.” She nodded to the girl they had been following. She had the exact same dazed and monotone way of speaking. “Or you will be punished.”

Pete and Patrick immediately paired up, Pete climbing in front to drive and Patrick behind him. Joe climbed up behind Andy, still looking like he was about to fall asleep.

Brendon looked over at Dallon and grinned. “You’re still my favorite, Dally, don’t worry,” he said, fluttering his lashes. Dallon rolled his eyes.

“You can drive,” Dallon said, waving his hand for Brendon to climb on first.

Ryan and Zelda climbed onto the last ATV, Zelda driving because she still looked the most alert out of all of them. Dallon wondered how much sleep she got in a week.

They took off, one of the girls in front, Pete and Patrick, Andy and Joe, Brendon and Dallon, Zelda and Ryan, the other girl in back. Nobody said anything. Dallon stared straight ahead, not wanting to think about what they’d find at the end of all this.

What they found was another clearing, much larger, with a cabin standing in the center. The windows were lit with firelight, which Dallon assumed was either a fireplace or the fireproof lair of something equally fireproof and they were going to stop inside and be burned alive.

(They were told, after all, that their deaths would be slow and painful whether they cooperated or not, and there really was no death Dallon could imagine worse than burning alive.)

They climbed off the four wheelers and clustered together, staring at the front door with no small amount of fear. Dallon saw Patrick take a deep breath and walk forward first. The rest followed.

The interior of the cabin was cozy, dark woods and blacks and reds. There was a roaring fire in a fireplace in the corner, oil lamps on all the end tables and the coffee table, and a candle chandelier in the center of the ceiling. None of them took note of any of that, however, because there, sitting on the couch on the far wall, were two men. One sprawled out, looking comfortable and darkly gleeful, the other one staring at them blankly. The comfortable one spoke first.

“So glad you finally deigned to join us. I was beginning to worry you’d gotten lost,” Tyler Joseph declared grandly, grinning up at them all wolfishly. Beside him, Josh Dun continued to stare.


	18. My Name's Blurryface

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> There's something wrong with Tyler.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> In case you were wondering how Tyler and Josh came to be sitting in that cabin waiting for our band (baDUM tss) of misfits to arrive.
> 
> I'm aware that Tyler married Jenna not that long before Blurryface dropped. The timelines in this chapter are a bit weird due to not having a clear time frame and suddenly getting a clear time frame. This is the one time I will ever use the "it's fanfiction, fuck off" excuse. That said, it's fanfiction. Fuck off.

Tyler had off days. Days where he would hole himself up; sit in a corner in the dressing room as he quietly warmed up, close his bunk curtain, and just not talk to Josh. Sometimes, it would last a couple hours; others, a couple days. Much as Josh hated to see Tyler like that, he knew the best course of action was to just wait it out and be there when he was ready.

So Josh didn’t think Tyler was acting particularly out of the ordinary when the singer curled in on himself in the dressing room in whatever venue they were playing (Josh was pretty sure they were in somewhere in Kentucky). He just sent him soft smiles and bumped shoulders with him as they made their way to the stage.

Tyler was good enough at pretending that nothing was wrong on stage that the fans didn’t pick up on it. Just tiny cues that Josh could only see because he knew Tyler so well. The way his smiles didn’t quite reach his eyes, the slightly tenser-than-normal set to his shoulders, the couple extra deep breaths between the more personal songs.

They finished the show, Josh’s typical post-performance high only slightly marred by worry for Tyler, but overall it had been a great show, and nothing was going to change that.

“Sick as frick, Ty-Guy,” Josh said, bumping shoulders again. “All good?”

Tyler shrugged—a pretty typical response, given his state. “Just drained, Jishwa.”

That was fair, Josh would give that to him. He was getting drained too—touring was far more exhausting than he’d have imagined when he first joined the band. He couldn’t imagine how bad it must have been for Tyler, standing on stage and singing his own words about his own problems, and having hundreds of people shouting those words back. Josh wasn’t sure he even _had_  the emotional capacity for that.

“I feel ya, man,” Josh said sympathetically. “Almost done though.” Last show was the next day, then they could both go home and sleep for a month. Regroup, and whatnot. Tyler didn’t say anything, just nodded his head and made a beeline for the shower in the dressing room. Josh stared after him, concerned and helpless, but not especially confused and certainly not suspicious.

On the bus, Josh let Tyler be, bunk curtain pulled resolutely shut. He settled himself in the back lounge, not quite ready to try and sleep, opting instead to play Candy Crush for some indeterminate amount of time. He thought about texting Jenna, letting her know Tyler was having one of those days—maybe there was something she could do as his wife that Josh himself couldn’t do as best friend?—but he decided to wait on that, too. If Tyler wasn’t better by the time they hit the next venue, he’d tell Jenna.

* * *

Tyler was not better by the next venue.

If anything, Tyler was worse. He was still keeping to himself, except now, instead of drawing further in on himself whenever someone tried to talk to him, he lashed out. He was snapping at everyone, and Josh was hard pressed to believe it was just a byproduct of exhaustion.

“Whoa, Ty, hey,” Josh said, deciding to cut in when Tyler appeared about two seconds away from literally biting Mark Eshleman’s head off. Tyler snapped his head around to glare at Josh, and Mark took that as his chance to flee. “What’s gotten into you, man?”

“I’m _fine_ ,” Tyler snapped. “Why the hell is everyone asking me what’s wrong?”

Josh held out his hands in surrender. “You’re just acting a bit off, alright?” he explained, hoping that it didn’t set Tyler off even more.

The singer’s eyes narrowed, but he didn’t argue. His face smoothed out, and Tyler gave Josh a tentative smile. “You’re right,” he said after a moment. “I’m sorry.”

Josh laughed, hoping it didn’t sound as uneasy as it felt. “I, uh…think you should be telling Mark that,” he said. Tyler nodded.

“I will,” he promised. “After soundcheck.” Something in the way Tyler said it made something writhe in Josh’s gut, but he couldn’t identify what exactly it was.

* * *

Josh was surprised when, given his mood the past couple days, Tyler was still up for the traditional post-last-show adventure through whatever town they were in. But if Tyler was willing, maybe that meant he was getting out of his off-period, and far be it from Josh to argue with that. He wasn’t going to argue with bringing Mark, either—Mark was cool, and Tyler obviously felt bad about his earlier behavior.

All three of them were buzzing with post-show, post _tour_  excitement. Josh was already making plans for something he could do before the European leg kicked off. He’d probably end up not doing any of it, choosing instead to sleep like the dead, but it was fun to think up plans anyway.

They paused in front of a dark-windowed antiques store, and Tyler looked in longingly. “We should really start looking through the towns _before_  the show,” he lamented. Part of Josh was inclined to agree, but he also remembered Tyler’s state before the show—they weren’t exactly going anywhere.

“It’s a post-show celebration,” Josh remind him. “Tour’s over. We can’t celebrate the tour being over if it isn’t over yet.”

“We should still consider it for next time,” Tyler argued.

Josh just shrugged. He’d have kind of liked to get to see the inside of the shop, too, but he liked the tradition that they had.

Before long, they found themselves in front of a fairly crowded coffee shop. It looked like it was housing all the fans old enough to go to the show without parents but not old enough (or just didn’t want) to go to a club. Josh was about to steer Tyler away when Tyler opened the door.

“I haven’t been at the top of my game recently,” he said by way of explanation. “This is my way of apologizing.”

Josh wanted to accept that, but there was a twisting in his gut that told him that he shouldn’t.

* * *

When Josh got home, he slept. It was hard to fall asleep at first—always was, going from a bunk in a bus to a stationary bed—but once he managed, he stayed that way for a while.  
He woke up, disoriented and starving, because his phone just _would not shut up_. It was going crazy with calls and text notifications. Josh climbed to his feet and flicked his phone to silent. Whatever it was, it could wait until he’d eaten something.

He made it halfway through a bowl of cereal before curiosity got the better of him.

The calls were from a whole slew of family, friends, and crew. The texts were all links to news articles.

_Mark Eshleman was found dead early this morning in the Tuscabosa Amphitheater. Investigations are in progress._

Josh dropped his phone and collapsed to the ground. Of all the things he’d expected to happen when he woke up from his post-show coma, finding out that one of his best friends was dead was not one of them.

_Tyler_. Tyler probably didn’t know, was probably still asleep, probably…

Josh picked up his phone and blindly dialed Tyler’s number. _Hey, this is Tyler—_  Josh ended the call when it went straight to voicemail. He tried Jenna next, but her phone went to voicemail immediately, too. The part of Josh’s mind that wasn’t hung up on Mark’s death ( ~~ _murder_~~  his mind supplied traitorously) registered that it was strange, that neither of their phones were on, but as it was it was all he could do to clamber to his feet and run to the car.

Really, it was a miracle Josh managed not to crash the car, hit any animals/people, or get pulled over for reckless driving. When he got to Tyler’s, he didn’t even bother knocking. He had a key, so he used it (usually, this soon after tour, he wouldn’t come over, and he’d knock if he had, but…).

“Tyler?” he called, shutting the door behind him.

There was a heavy, eerie silence settled over the house, Josh’s mind working in overdrive, until Tyler came down the stairs looking like he just woke up. He was wearing one of his hoodies, hood pulled up and hands shoved deep in his pockets. He stared at Josh in confusion before speaking. “Where’s the fire?”

Josh, trying hard to catch his breath, now that he knew that Tyler was not also dead, that he had just been tired, carefully formed the words that he hadn’t quite managed to get his head around. “Mark…Mark’s…He’s _dead_ , Tyler.” His voice broke on ‘ _dead_ ’ and Josh was finding it harder and harder to breathe.

Tyler…

Tyler didn’t react. At all. He just blinked at Josh standing there, having a breakdown because one of their _best friends_  had just been _killed_ , and he didn’t seem even the slightest bit bothered.

Josh remembered the way Tyler had snapped at Mark, the way his stomach twisted when Tyler said he’d apologize, the way he felt that Tyler was lying about why he wanted to go see the fans. _That’s ridiculous_ , he chided himself, even as he stared at Tyler with suspicion starting to rise up. _Tyler’s not a killer_.

Too late, Tyler muttered, “That’s awful,” and Josh wanted to grant that it was shock that caused the delayed reaction, but all of a sudden there was a scream from upstairs.

“ _JOSH, HELP!_ ”

Josh stared up at the stairs, then back at Tyler. Tyler was staring right back, a hard glint to his eyes that Josh didn’t recognize in the slightest, daring Josh to push past him and run up towards where he’d heard Jenna’s voice.

“Turn around, Josh,” Tyler suggested softly. “Go home and pretend none of this happened, and everything will be okay.”

~~_Not Tyler that’s not Tyler that can’t be Tyler it’s not_ ~~

Josh wasn’t sure he was breathing anymore, he wasn’t sure what had happened to Tyler, he wasn’t sure what he was meant to do about any of this, but he was sure of something:

Tyler had killed Mark ( ~~ _not Tyler that’s not Tyler_~~ ) and he was about to kill Jenna unless Josh did _something_. So Josh took off running, using Tyler’s shock to shove past him and up the stairs. At the top he called Jenna’s name, hoping she was still conscious enough that she could respond and clue Josh in to which room she was in.

“ _IN HERE!_ ”

Josh shouldered open the door he heard her voice from and almost passed out. As it was, he was having a really hard time not to vomit at the sight in front of him. Jenna was zip tied to a chair, completely naked, with every single cut and scratch clearly visible. Almost every inch of her was covered in blood, and her normally blonde hair was stained red. Josh slammed the door shut, right before Tyler ( ~~ _not Tyler_~~ ) made it in. He locked the door and moved the heavy dresser so that it was in front of the door, trying to ignore Tyler’s ( _NOT TYLER_ ) banging on the door.

“Jenna,” Josh whispered, kneeling down in front of her. There was a table full of knives and needles right next to the chair, every single one bloodied. Josh didn’t want to touch them, because he didn’t want to get his fingerprints on everything, but he was starting to see that he didn’t have a choice. “Jenna, what happened?”

Jenna was sobbing, and Josh could see that she was losing coherency fast. “I don’t…came home…laughing…Mark dead…”

Josh couldn’t decode that fast enough, because he could hear the dresser shifting and the door hinges creaking, and he realized that Tyler was going to make it in soon. So he grabbed the smallest blade off the table and cut the ties holding Jenna to the chair and helped her stand. “Here’s what we’re going to do,” he whispered comfortingly.

“ _You’re not going to do anything Joshie,_ ” not-Tyler called through the door. “ _I’m going to kill both of you, and he’s going to scream at me as I do it._ ”

“He’s going to bust open the door, and he’s going to come towards us,” Josh continued, as if not-Tyler hadn’t said anything. “And we’re going to run past him. Get into my car. You’re going to be fine, Jenna, I _swear_.”

“ _He_ swears _Jenna_ ,” not-Tyler repeated. “ _You’re going to be okay._ ”

Jenna sobbed at the sound of Tyler’s voice, taunting her through the door. Josh couldn’t blame her. They’d both need therapy when this was over.

The door slammed open suddenly, and the dresser slid across the floor and straight into Josh and Jenna, pinning both of them against the wall. Not-Tyler stood in the doorway, hood still drawn and hands still in his pocket. Now, though, Josh could see the faint discolor of bloodstains in the black fabric.

“It was a nice idea,” Tyler admitted. “But you didn’t realize something important.” He pulled his hands out of his pockets and pulled the hood down, stared at Josh, and blinked, eyes turning blood red. Josh felt like he was staring into the pits of hell—this was torture enough, and that’s not to mention what not-Tyler was certainly about to do to him, given what he’d already done to Jenna. “I’m not Tyler.”

“Nope, I…realized…that,” Josh wheezed, trying to shove the dresser away. If anything, it moved even closer.

Not-Tyler looked angry. “Oh, this little fuck’s heart is singing, now,” he growled. “And you, _Jishwa_ , are undoing every. Single. Thing. I’ve done so far.”

Josh coughed. He felt like he could feel the dresser cracking a couple ribs. Jenna was going more limp with every moment that passed—if they didn’t get out of here soon, she wasn’t going to make it. “Good,” he ground out. He didn’t know exactly what this _thing_  had done so far, but Josh was more than happy to counteract it.

Not-Tyler grinned ferally. “You know what?” he asked rhetorically. “It is great, Joshie. Would you like to know why?”

Josh didn’t answer, but that may have been because he couldn’t draw the breath to. He hoped his glare was enough of an answer.

Not-Tyler’s grin widened. “You are going to help me,” he explained. _Oh, great, he’s going to monologue_ , Josh thought sardonically. “You see, I am trying to tear poor Tyler Joseph apart. Mark Eshleman, his wife…You were next on my list. And then you showed up in the living room, so impatient to die. But Tyler here,” not-Tyler pointed to his head, “gave me a brilliant idea. See, I thought that if I forced Tyler to watch as I killed everyone Tyler loves with Tyler’s own hands, that would break him down more effectively than anything else. But imagine, Tyler’s _best friend_ , helping me, in his own right mind. That would break _my_  heart. If it existed, of course.”

Josh wanted to respond, to say that he would rather die—even by Tyler’s hands—than agree to help break his best friend by helping to kill all his other friends, but there was still the dresser pushing the air out of his lungs and about to break his ribs.

“Now, I can imagine you’re trying to ask me why you’d agree to that, and the truth is that I can’t motivate you beyond the threat of death,” not-Tyler admitted, waving a hand. “And there’s not enough of an effect if I’m holding you at a metaphorical gunpoint, because then you’re not helping me of your own volition. But I assure you, Joshie, that if you help me, you will be _greatly_  rewarded.” The grin that accompanied the statement would have been more fitting on a wolf.

Josh felt as if he and Jenna were both about to die.

Not-Tyler turned around and walked out of the room, the dresser backing away from Josh and Jenna enough that Josh could stagger away, supporting the now-unconscious Jenna’s weight. He wrapped her in the blanket from the bed and carried her out to his car.

He didn’t know why not-Tyler let them go, or why he was letting Josh get Jenna to the hospital, but he wasn’t going to complain. He sat in the chair beside Jenna’s bed, staring at all the monitors and wires and tubes that she was hooked up to. It broke his heart, but even worse was the fact that when ( _if_ , Josh’s traitorous mind reminded him) she woke up, she probably wouldn’t remember that it wasn’t actually her husband that had done this to her. And even if she did, that wouldn’t make it any less Tyler’s hands, Tyler’s face, Tyler’s voice.

Josh stayed awake by Jenna all night, because that’s what Tyler would have wanted. Tyler would want Josh to make sure that as many people survived not-Tyler’s wrath as possible, and the only way to do that would be to join him.

Staring at the unconscious Jenna Joseph, Josh realized that the only way that he could possibly save his best friend was to agree to help break him.

* * *

The entire “Blurryface” campaign was not-Tyler’s idea. He thought it was _funny_ , to make an album about himself. It also gave him a name that Josh could call him by.

The entire cycle, Blurryface would let himself get even closer to Tyler’s friends, act a bit off and let them get concerned, then repeat the cycle. Josh didn’t understand why he was toying with his future victims just as much as he was toying with Tyler, but he didn’t want to question him, lest he be found out.

Josh tried to warn as many people as possible, but it was hard to tell people that Tyler wasn’t Tyler and that Blurryface was real and that he’d killed Mark and almost killed Jenna, so really the warnings ended up being ‘ _Be_ _careful around Tyler, he’s…volatile?_ ’

Mark’s murder investigation remained open for seven months before it was declared a cold case—there wasn’t enough evidence against anybody, and certainly not against Tyler, for them to incriminate anybody. Josh couldn’t figure out why nobody was framed before he realized: there’s nothing worse than your friend being murdered and nobody, not even the wrong person, getting punished for it.

Jenna woke up after three months—three long months of the doctors imploring Josh to have the plug pulled, and Josh refusing because if Tyler killed Mark _and_  Jenna _and_  thought Josh was helping then there was nothing Josh would have been able to do to help him. Josh had tried to convince her to stay close by, near enough that Tyler could be told and shown that she was alive and healing and that she wasn’t going to die, but Jenna was too afraid—afraid of Tyler or afraid of Blurryface, Josh couldn’t tell. He’d told her everything, and she seemed to believe him, but everything about Blurryface had been too much like Tyler for it not to have taken a toll on Jenna’s trust in her husband.

It wasn’t until Blurryface started sending out his nightmarish creatures that Josh realized that the ultimate plan wasn’t just to destroy Tyler, but the world as well. Josh felt as if at some point, Blurryface was planning on letting Tyler come back in control of his body, after everything was already dead and gone and it was just the two of them (or maybe even just him) standing alone surrounded by the carnage.

Josh hadn’t even known about targeting their friends. He hadn’t known that Pete Wentz, Patrick Stump, Andy Hurley, Joe Trohman, Brendon Urie, and Dallon Weekes were on their way to where they were, about to step right into Blurryface’s trap. He hadn’t known that six more of their friends were about to die by Tyler’s own hands, and that this time, he was expected to help.

The world was ending, Mark Eshleman was dead, Jenna may never forgive Tyler, and soon he’d find out that Kenneth Harris and Dan Pawlovich were dead. Enough was enough.

Josh would help Tyler, or he would die trying, but this was clearly not the way to go about it.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Well I mean OBVIOUSLY it wasn't Tyler
> 
> Does that mean that the next few chapters are any less heart wrenching? Of fucking course not. It's gonna be a wild ride, kids. Hang on tight.


	19. My Treehouse is on Fire (and for Some Reason I Smell Gas on My Hands)

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Picks up immediately where 17 left off.
> 
> Sorry this is so short. The next couple aren't much better. I'm trying. *insert supernatural "writing is hard" gif*

After a heavy silence that seemed to last an eternity, Tyler _tsk_ ed at them. “No manners,” he tutted. “Tragic. Isn’t it tragic, Joshie?”

Josh looked up at Tyler and nodded. “It is. No manners, even in the face of death.”

Nobody said anything. Joe, for as exhausted as he’d been the entire time they’d been traveling, was wide awake now as they stared at their friends, who were apparently the harbingers of the apocalypse.

Tyler sighed heavily. “You’re supposed to _apologize_ ,” he prompted. “For making me, a friend, worry about what may have happened to you.”

“I’m sorry you thought you weren’t going to be able to kill us yourself,” Pete intoned. Even in the face of imminent death, Patrick still hit Pete for his dumbassery.

Tyler’s face darkened, and Joe finally realized that /Tyler Joseph/ had caused the apocalypse, had played them, had made them all think they were friends before sending for them to be _killed_. Tyler Joseph was terrifying, and Joe was about to die. He wouldn’t see Marie and Ruby again, he wasn’t going to help save the world, Tyler Joseph was about to kill him in a log cabin in the middle of scenic nowhere.

“You think you’re funny, don’t you?” Tyler hissed at Pete. Pete shrugged. Tyler’s eyes narrowed. “You’re lucky that I’ve been planning this for too long to change my mind now.” Suddenly, the singer laughed. “Oh, wait, no. No, you aren’t lucky. Josh, lead them to their… _room_.”

Joe didn’t miss the way that Tyler said ‘room,’ singular. He also didn’t miss the way he said it, as if the word _room_  was a very generous description of wherever they were about to be taken.

Josh stood up, not quite looking at them, looking more above their heads. Joe thought that was rather rude—he should be looking them all directly in the face if he was going to betray them like this.

Josh began to lead them out of the cabin, and right before the door shut, Tyler called after them. “Oh, and Zelda, dear. Thank you for bringing them directly to me.”

* * *

Everybody (except the one Singer had called Josh) stopped cold on the front porch as the door swung shut behind them, all turning to stare at Zelda. “Guys, I didn’t—” she tried, but she stopped. There was nothing she’d have been able to say to them that would convince them that she hadn’t known that Singer himself was the one behind all of this. She hadn’t given them anywhere near enough reason to trust her, but had instead given them plenty of reason not to.

“Save it,” Patrick growled, even though that’s already what Zelda had decided to do. Zelda wondered how much more mercy they’d all have on her than Singer would.

“We need to move,” Josh interrupted, before anybody could say another word. “He’ll get angry if we stay here.”

“Oh, _he’ll_  get angry?” Dallon demanded. “ _Tyler_  will get angry? And how about you, Josh? Will you get _angry_  too?”

Josh turned around, not looking directly at any of them. “I’ll explain on the way,” he said to the ground. “But we need to get moving.”

Zelda looked around at the group of musicians staring at Josh, each and every one of them looking betrayed beyond belief. She had no idea who Josh was meant to be to any of them, but he was clearly someone they had trusted before the world began to end.

“How long?” Patrick asked smally, stepping down off the porch. The others began to follow.

Josh took a deep breath, leading them back into the trees. “Since Mark,” he said finally. “I noticed that there was something wrong with Tyler a couple days before the end of that tour, but I thought he was just…being Tyler. You know how he gets.”

“Clearly, we don’t,” Pete pointed out, voice carefully even.

“Got,” Josh corrected. “Guys, that isn’t Tyler.”

“Oh, and you’re not Josh either then, right?” Brendon demanded, bordering on hysteria. Studying all of them more closely, Zelda could see that they were all heading that way.

Josh shifted uncomfortably. “No, I…I am. Myself. Completely myself.”

“If you’re going to make excuses for Tyler, you may as well use the excuse for yourself,” Joe muttered darkly.

Josh shook his head. “I’m not making excuses,” he argued. “Look around. The world’s ending and he’s about to kill all of you. There’s no / _making excuses_ / for that.”

“No, there isn’t,” Brendon agreed. “So why are you trying?”

“Because—” Josh cut himself off, growling in frustration. “I promise you guys, I am going to try to do  _everything_  I can to get you out of this alive. But you have to believe me. Something’s happened to Tyler, something has _possessed_  Tyler, and it wants to tear his mind apart so it’s killing all of his friends. It killed Mark, it _tortured_  Jenna, it’s completely cutting Tyler off from his family…”

“So what?” demanded Pete. “You agreed to help this thing to save yourself? Some best friend you are, Tyler /trusted/ you!”

“You think it’s that simple?” Josh demanded, rounding on them. Zelda’s step faltered as she noticed the shadows pulsing around him. “That my choice was really die or help that _thing_? Do you really think I’d have _chosen_  to destroy my best friend like that? Jenna was in a coma for _three weeks_ , Pete. If I hadn’t been there, she’d be _dead_. Furthermore, I managed to convince him not to kill _these two_ —” He pointed at Brendon and Dallon. “—at Exeter, or any of the other _countless_  times we’ve been at the same festival as either of you. I convinced him to wait, because he’s already murdered one of Tyler’s friends backstage at a show, and what’s the fun in repeating it when you can change every single time? I bought all of you time, I bought myself time, I bought Tyler time. I am not helping that demon, I am helping the human that he’s trying to destroy. I am helping _T_ _yler_.”

“He’s calling himself Blurryface, isn’t he?” Ryan asked, finally speaking up for the first time since they climbed onto the four wheelers back in the woods. When everyone turned to look at him, he shrugged. “I really like the album.”

Josh nodded. “He thought it was a funny joke. I thought it was sick.”

“More inclined to agree with you, to be honest,” Joe muttered.

Josh nodded. “Now, come on. If I take too long, he’ll start to get suspicious. I’ll try to check in on you guys later, all right?”

There was silence as Josh led them the rest of the way through the trees, stopping finally in front of an especially old-looking oak, with its branches low.

“Our room…is a tree?” Brendon asked after a moment of waiting for Josh to continue walking. In answer, Josh pointed up. They all looked into the upper branches, where there was an impressive treehouse tucked away.

“Um, problem.” Joe said, raising a hand like he was a student asking the teacher a question. “Leg’s broke. Can’t climb.”

Josh shrugged. “You’ll have to figure something out,” he said apologetically. “Because this is the prison he prepared for you.”

* * *

It took some maneuvering, but they all managed to get Joe into the treehouse without causing him too much pain. Immediately after they were all inside the treehouse, and Josh was out of their sight, Pete rounded on Zelda and threw a punch in her direction.

He hit her in the jaw, and everybody in the treehouse held their breaths, terrified to see what Zelda would do. Even Pete, with all his anger and bravado, looked just as terrified now, of what Zelda would do, as he’d been when they left the truck. Andy could see Patrick preparing to step in and defend Pete, but Zelda just sighed.

“When my hometown fell, I ran into the nearest copse of trees I could find and I hid. Something like a week later, I was starving, I was barely hydrated enough to live, and I was scared. I was ready to just curl up in the nearest pile of leaves and die. And then right there in front of me, there was a man who called himself ‘Singer,’ who told me that there was a place for me nearby to recover.

“That’s how I met Murdock. He nursed me back to health, and explained to me what it is to be a Survivor. And what it is to be a Survivor is to help other Survivors, and to listen to Singer. Murdock said that Singer doesn’t answer many questions, so don’t bother asking. But Singer knows what’s best for us, he’s been a Survivor longest.

“Singer told me, one day, that there was a band. A band called Fall Out Boy. And that band was playing a show in Washington, DC, where I was squatting at the time. He told me that whoever was behind this, whatever was behind this, they wanted that band Fall Out Boy dead, because that band could stop all of this. I was to find them, save them, and train them to survive. Singer would tell me where we needed to go later, and once he did I was to plan the trip to wherever that was.

“I didn’t ask Singer how he knew that whoever was behind this wanted a random band dead, how he knew they could stop it, how he knew where we needed to go. You _don’t_  question Singer. I just did as he said because that is what you _do_.”

“So what you’re saying,” Pete ground out, nursing his hand. Andy thought it might be broken. Again. “Is that you had no idea that you’ve been working for a fucking _demon_  this whole time?”

Zelda shrugged. “I can’t make you believe me. I can’t explain it in any way that makes it seem plausible, and since we’re at the end now it doesn’t matter that you don’t trust me. We’re all stuck in this treehouse and we’re all going to die.”

“If I didn’t know any better,” Andy started, studying Zelda carefully, “I’d say you were scared.”

“Of fucking _course_  I’m scared!” Zelda all-but shouted. “I’m _terrified_. We’re about to die, but I don’t know how it’s going to happen!”

“I scream, you scream, we all scream because we’re terrified,” Brendon mumbled. Everybody turned to stare at him.

“ _What?_ ” demanded Ryan.

“ _I scream, you scream, we all scream because we’re terrified_ ,” Brendon repeated, singing this time. “ _Of what’s around the corner._ ”

Patrick joined him. “ _We stay in place cuz we don’t wanna lose our lives, so let’s think of something better. Down in the forest, we’ll sing a chorus, one that everybody knows. Hands held higher…_ ”

Both froze, not finishing the line. Andy had only heard the song a couple times, so he could vaguely place the tune, but he had no chance of finishing the line. He was a drummer for a reason.

He saw, though, as Pete and Dallon figured it out, staring at the singers with a mixture of shock and fear.

“He’s not that clever, is he?” Pete asked after a moment.

“He’s in Tyler’s head,” Patrick reminded him. “We’re in a treehouse in a forest.”

“Will somebody tell me what the fuck revelation you’ve come to?” Zelda demanded.

_Down in the forest, we’ll sing a chorus_  
One that everybody knows   
Hands held higher,   
WE’LL BE ON FIRE

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Am I sorry? Maybe like, the tiniest bit.
> 
> Tyler also being Zelda's Singer was a pretty on-the-spot decision. Originally I made the man with all the info Singer because of Bobby Singer, from Supernatural.
> 
> If I were you, I'd start looking into all the TØP songs about/involving death. There's a lot of them, but you've got two weeks. Happy searching :)
> 
> pyromanicschizophrenic.tumblr.com


	20. I've Got Troubled Thoughts (and the Projected Lifespan to Match)

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> HA HA HA IT'S FUNNY LOOK HOW FUNNY THIS IS HAHAHA HA HA H A H A H A H A H A

“Well. I mean, that could. That could mean anything,” Joe tried to reason. “I mean, there’s a line about treehouses in ‘Stressed Out,’ too. I’m sure that you’re just…” He trailed off. “Oh, God, he’s going to burn this whole forest down, isn’t he?”

“You know, the forest fire thing was cool when you did it,” Pete joked weakly, looking at Ryan. “Something tells me this won’t be cool.”

“Hang on,” Zelda interrupted. “That Josh guy said that Singer— _Tyler_  wasn’t possessed until sometime after you guys all met them. But this song you’re talking about, that was written well before that happened.”

“Yeah,” Patrick agreed. “Tyler’s got some problems.”

Pete could see Zelda look like she wanted to say something, but she just sighed and let it go, choosing to sit on the floor in the corner of the treehouse.

“How long do you think we’ve got?” Brendon asked shakily, sitting himself down beside Joe. “Until he…you know.”

“Josh seems to think we’ve got enough time for him to come back and check in on us again,” Dallon answered nervously. The worst thing, Pete felt, was that there weren’t even windows, just centimeter-wide spaces between the wooden slats and the trapdoor- type entrance on the floor. And with all of them crammed into the treehouse, they needed to keep the door shut or risk one of them falling out of it.

Patrick sat down beside Pete, but Pete didn’t notice because he was busy staring at the trapdoor. “That clever,” he agreed belatedly. “But not that obvious.”

“What?” Andy asked, looking over at Pete along with everybody else.

“‘Everyone gather around for a show,’” Pete quoted. “‘Watch as this man disappears as we know. Do me a favor and try to ignore when you watch him fall through a bleeding trapdoor.’ Tyler’s written a _lot_  of songs about death, guys. If we looked around more, _everything_  in here would be a clue. And all of them would be different.”

“Oh, that’s just wonderful,” Ryan muttered. “There’s a hundred ways we could die, and we don’t know which one that psychopath is going to go with.”

“And we still don’t know when,” Zelda reminded them from her corner. “We’re stuck, in a wooden box, with no idea when or how we’re going to die.”

“Hang on,” Joe interrupted. “If you led us here, did everything he asked for, then why are _you_  still here?” Zelda just shrugged. “But seriously, whether you knew or not, I’d have let you live.”

“He razed my town to the ground,” Zelda reminded him. “He killed my family. He killed _Hunter_. I didn’t help you because he told me to, I helped you because I thought you’d help me get revenge. He’s not about to reward me when my entire motivation’s been to stop him.”

“Isn’t that…Josh’s motivation?” Dallon pointed out.

“I don’t think Tyler— _Blurryface_  is aware that Josh is trying to stop him,” Patrick said thoughtfully. “Josh needs him to think that he’s _helping_  him.”

It got quiet after that. Pete looked around, saw everybody else lost in their own thoughts. Zelda, for once, seemed to be showing her emotions the most. It would have made Pete feel bad if not for the fact that they clearly weren’t actually going to be able to save anyone, and all she’d done was keep them from their families for no reason at all.

If he was going to die, Pete hoped that Bronx, Megan, and Saint were safe at least. He even hoped Ashlee wasn’t dead or even hurt. He hoped his parents were okay, and basically every single person he’d ever met wasn’t dying or dead in a ditch. If he couldn’t save anybody, he really hoped that there weren’t too many people that he knew personally that were going to suffer excessively.

“ _I have these thoughts so often I ought to replace that slot with what I once bought,_ ” Brendon mumbled under his breath suddenly.

“Cuz somebody stole my car radio and now I just sit in silence,” Dallon finished for him.

“Can we please stop listing all of Tyler’s lyrics that are applicable to our situation?” Ryan snapped. “I’d rather not have a full list of possible deaths, thanks.”

“Personally, I’d rather not die at all,” Joe pointed out. “Also, should we discount Heathens from our list?”

“For Ryan’s sanity, we’ll discount Heathens from the list,” Brendon offered.

“What’s Heathens?” Zelda asked.

“Tyler wrote a song for the Suicide Squad movie,” Andy explained.

“It was definitely Blurryface that wrote the song,” Brendon corrected.

“Oh, wonderful. The psychopath wrote a song for a movie about a bunch of psychopaths.”

* * *

Getting away to see the “prisoners,” as Blurryface called them, was not even remotely easy. Josh was on a tether—which he expected, after how long it took him to get them out to their treehouse prison.

“You know,” Blurryface said conversationally, a couple days after they’d all arrived, “we should probably feed them.”

Josh nodded. “Unless your plans are starving them to death,” he pointed out. He hoped that wasn’t the plan. There was no way to repeatedly sneak food out to them.

Blurryface hummed, as if he were actually thinking about it. “You’re right,” he allowed. “That’s no fun, Joshie. We’ll just have to feed them something now and kill them later. Do you think they’re having fun in their box?”

Josh was reminded rather suddenly of an episode of that old Nickelodeon show Fairly OddParents— _fun box, oh fun box, small and square and dark; fun box, oh fun box, check out these cool fun locks!_

Josh needed to get Tyler back.

“You certainly gave them plenty of false leads,” he said noncommittally, not wanting Blurryface to think he was ignoring him—that never led anywhere good. “I’m sure they’re uneasy with thoughts of how y— _we’re_  going to kill them.” He almost said  _you_ , like he almost always did.

Blurryface grinned. Even though it was never about anything he was planning to do to Josh, that grin always made Josh’s insides twist fearfully. “You’re right, Joshie,” Blurryface said, clapping Josh on the shoulder. “You go feed them.”

It was probably the only opportunity Josh would be given—which is why it felt like a setup.

Regardless, he went into the kitchen and grabbed the food that Blurryface had labelled ‘ _Pets_ ’ out of the fridge that Josh never questioned the functionality of, and made his way down to the treehouse.

When he got there, he could tell that the two days had really taken their toll on his friends (and one of Blurryface’s so called Survivors and also _Ryan Ross_ ). They looked haggard and like they’d hardly slept at all, not to mention the way they all jumped a mile high when Josh climbed in through the trapdoor.

“Apparently starving you to death isn’t fun enough for him,” Josh said, placing the food on the ground without pulling himself entirely into the treehouse.

“So what _is_  fun enough for him?” asked Brendon, sounding more small and vulnerable than Josh had ever heard him. It broke his heart knowing that he could have done— _should_  have done more to stop Blurryface before it ever got this far.

Josh shook his head. “I don’t know what he’s planning. He set this prison so you guys would get all these ideas on what he might be planning to do, but I don’t know which one if any of these references he’s going to go with.”

“And this is where compliance gets us,” the only girl of the group said. Josh thought that Blurryface had called her Zelda, but he wasn’t entirely sure. “Hate to think what happens to those who struggle.”

Josh cringed. “Nothing good,” he muttered distantly. He could still smell the blood. He shook his head to clear it. “I have to go back before he starts to get suspicious. More suspicious.”

“Just one thing, Josh,” Dallon requested, and Josh hated the helpless tone in his friend’s voice. “And we need the truth. What are the chances we’ll survive this?” Josh knew he was really asking _what are the chances you’ll save us?_  and he hated that the answer was,

“They’re not high, guys.” He took a deep breath. “I’ve got a plan, but it’s weak, and hinges on my being able to convince him to make a very specific decision, and for him to go about it in a very specific way. I’m working on more, I just…need to convince him draw out this part. The keeping you waiting for death.”

* * *

“He wasn’t kidding about waiting for death,” mumbled Pete dully, head resting on Patrick’s shoulder. Patrick wanted to comfort Pete, because that’s what he always did. But he couldn’t say anything that would even remotely come across as genuine, because he felt the exact same way. They all did. They’d been fed again, by one of the weird monotone girls instead of Josh. Patrick couldn’t tell how long it had been since they’d gotten there, but he did know that this sitting around waiting for _something_  to happen was a worse torture than anything he could have imagined.

The only thing worse would have been picking them off one by one and forcing them to watch each other die. Patrick wasn’t ruling that out as a possibility.

“I can’t tell if your friend has succeeded in buying himself more time, or if this was always his plan,” Zelda muttered. She’d been staring out at something outside, using the thin space between two of the boards as a window. Patrick didn’t ask what she was looking at, wasn’t sure he wanted to know. “But we’re going to freeze to death if he doesn’t hurry. It’s snowing.”

Pete was off of Patrick’s shoulder in a heartbeat, pressing his face to the wall to better look outside. “It’d be pretty if we weren’t in an uninsulated treehouse waiting to be killed by our friend,” he said.

Patrick turned so that he could look out too. Already, some of the snow had reached the ground, and the treetops they could see from their prison were blanketed in white. It wasn’t a blizzard, or even anything as impressive as he was used to, but being that he was from Chicago, he hadn’t expected much. Pete was right, though.

It’d be beautiful if they weren’t about to die.

* * *

“I know he said he was trying,” mumbled Brendon, lying on his side and facing the wall. It was possible that he was watching the world outside, but equally possible that he was just staring blankly, or even had his eyes closed. “But I’m starting to think Josh has forgotten about us.”

“That’s ridiculous,” Dallon shot down immediately. He was trying to convince himself just as much as Brendon.

They’d just been fed again, and brought scratchy-but-warm blankets, but no word from Josh.

“The snow’s melting,” Brendon announced.

* * *

“I don’t want to die like this, ‘Trick,” Pete confessed, late at night when there wasn’t even moonlight illuminating their wooden prison.

“No,” Patrick agreed. “Me neither.”

“Josh said he needed time,” Andy reminded them, from the corner farthest away from Pete and Patrick.

“We’ve given him time,” Brendon pointed out. “He’s running out. We’re running out.”

It was snowing again.

* * *

Two more days. Two more days until Josh could do anything. He’d convinced Blurryface, but he needed to wait _two more days._

It was better than nothing. He just hoped they were all doing okay.

* * *

They were not doing okay. Hope had been lost, and all eight of them were silent, staring at varying points of the treehouse or spaces between the planks, lost in thoughts that were darker than whatever may have lied ahead. Thinking about their deaths, about the fates of their families and their friends, about the lives they’d led and the mistakes they’d made, the good things they’d done and the people their music had helped (in Zelda’s case, the other Survivors she’d helped long enough for them to be able to Survive on their own).

Suddenly, an entire wall of the treehouse was ripped off. Everybody within scrambled back towards the opposite wall, as the house was filled with shadows. Ryan was the only one who obviously knew what it meant. He was also the most resigned to his fate.

The shadows snaked in and wrapped themselves around Patrick’s waist and pulled him out of the treehouse.

It was hard to tell whose screams were louder, his or Pete’s.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> H A H A H A i'm going to hell
> 
> Writing is hard. Knitting is harder. Free time? What free time? I'm making an afghan because this story's being difficult.
> 
> (Actually I'm making an afghan for my friend whose wife is pregnant, and I'm over here writing a fanfiction for band members who will never know my name)
> 
> BUT PANIC! THO
> 
> pyromanicschizophrenic.tumblr.com


	21. Waste My Time Dreaming of Being Alive

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Please forgive any errors in formatting. I did it all meticulously as always, then forgot to save the draft like a FUCKING IDIOT. So I did all of it again at a quarter to ten at night in like, five minutes.
> 
> I am remarkably overestimating the seating capacity and gas mileage of a HMMWV. But as there is no greater plot device than a motherfucking Humvee, I say ONWARDS!

“Shh, shh, Patrick, _Patrick_ , it’s _me,_ it’s Josh, it’s—Patrick _please,_ for the love of _God,_ stop screaming.”

Patrick did stop screaming, less because Josh begged him to and more because he needed to breathe.

Wait,  _Josh?_

“Josh, what…” Patrick started, but he realized he didn’t have any idea what he wanted to ask Josh. _Where have you been? What are you doing here? How did you get here? How did_  I  _get here?_  They were all good questions.

He didn’t get the chance to ask them, though, because Josh shushed him. He looked like he was listening to something. When Patrick listened more closely, he could hear Pete screaming in the distance. “How far—”

“A distance,” Josh answered succinctly. “I’ll explain when they’re all here, just…wait. I need to focus.”

The shadows around Josh rippled and spread, taking a serpentine form and stretching towards the direction Pete’s screams were coming from.

“I don’t—”

“ _Shut up_ ,” Josh snapped, the shadow-snake wavering a bit.

There was more screaming after a moment, and Pete’s voice started to grow louder, until Pete was crumpled on the ground in front of Patrick, hands covering his face as he trembled. He hopped to his feet, shouting wordlessly until his eyes landed on Patrick.

“Oh thank  _God_ ,” he whimpered. “I was afraid I’d lost you.”

“Well if you had, you wouldn’t have been without me long,” Patrick pointed out. He nodded over to Josh. “He’ll explain later.”

“Yes, and if you could let me _concentrate_ ,” Josh hissed. The shadows elongated again, and Patrick realized belatedly that Josh was controlling them.

(He thought he was going to die not five minutes ago, he refused to acknowledge that he should have realized it sooner.)

A couple moments later, Brendon was huddled on the forest floor in front of them, a harsh scratch on his shoulder.

“I almost dropped him,” Josh said, by way of explanation. His face was pale and he was sweating profusely. “I need a minute.” He staggered, then collapsed.

“The rest of them are _still up there_ ,” Patrick pointed out, angrily gesturing in the direction Josh had sent the shadows for Pete and Brendon. “And they think we’re _dead_.”

“Yes, Patrick, I know,” Josh agreed tiredly. “But I’ve never used this much power at once before. I’ve kind of only been using it on an as-necessary basis.”

“Wait, _power_?” Brendon repeated, climbing shakily to his feet. “You mean…You mean you did this?”

“The shadow thing, yes,” Josh nodded. “And those weird girls, the ones who sound like they’re hypnotized. They answer to me. Of course, they answer to Blurryface too, so I have to do what he wants me to do with them, but I am in their chain of command.” He was still breathing heavily, but he already looked like he was doing much better than he was a moment ago. “Ultimately, he wants to kill you himself, but he wants me to rough you up a bit, first.” He took a deep breath, then sent the shadows out again. This time, Patrick and Pete stayed quiet, and kept Brendon from asking more questions.

It took a little bit longer than the last time, but then Dallon was on the ground in front of them, red in the face and looking like a man with nothing left. As soon as he caught sight of the others, his eyes lit up and he climbed gracelessly to his feet, wrapping his arms around Brendon and holding tight.

It continued in a similar pattern, Josh able to grab one or two people before needing to take a moment to recuperate. By the time it got down to Zelda being the only one still in the treehouse, he looked like he might pass out from the strain.

“One more,” Josh wheezed, clinging to the tree nearest him. “When she’s here…run. That way.” He gestured in the direction directly opposite from where he’d been sending the shadows.

“Not without you,” Dallon said firmly. “We already have to carry Joe, we’ll carry you too.”

Josh shook his head. “He can track me. If I go with you, we’re all dead. I can come up with a viable excuse how you all escaped, but I can’t do anything for Tyler if I’m dead.”

“Neither can we,” Patrick pointed out. “And we can’t do anything for him if we run away from here, either.”

Josh stared at all of them, resolute even through the exhaustion, pain, and fear on their faces. He nodded.

“When this Tyler guy’s back to normal, he’d better be a fucking phenomenal guy,” Ryan mumbled, helping Andy grab Joe around the waist. Patrick and Pete moved over so they were closer to Josh. They were going to need to grab him as he fell if they wanted to be ready to run as soon as Zelda joined them.

She was the only one who landed on her feet, and with a knife drawn, no less. “Just run,” Ryan informed her, starting off with Joe and Andy. Pete and Patrick carried Josh, and Zelda took it all in stride and ran beside Brendon.

“This is not at all what I expected,” she noted, glancing backward, probably on the lookout for anything chasing them.

“Yeah, I don’t think anyone saw any of this coming,” Brendon pointed out. “Tyler being possessed, Josh controlling shadows, us still having a chance.”

“Is that a fucking Humvee?” Pete demanded. Patrick looked ahead and did, in fact, see a military style vehicle waiting in a clearing.

“A trap, probably,” he pointed out.

Josh stirred. “N’, ’s fine,” he slurred. “Iss for you.”

They deposited Joe and Josh into the back, then climbed in hurriedly.

“How long before they start coming for us, do you think?” Joe asked, leaning forward to talk to the others.

“Hopefully long enough,” Andy answered, as Ryan started the Humvee and started driving off into the trees.

As if one cue, the scent of smoke filled the air.

* * *

“I DON’T THINK WE CAN OUTDRIVE A FOREST FIRE, RYAN!” Brendon shouted, as the flames became visible behind them. The end of the tree line was also visible in front of them, but the flames were approaching much more rapidly.

“Not with that attitude,” Pete mumbled, eyes closed as if he could pretend that none of this was happening.

“DO YOU HAVE ANY BETTER IDEAS, BRENDON?!” demanded Ryan, ignoring Pete entirely. The Humvee was going as fast as he could possibly get it to go, but he could tell by the increase of heat that if they managed to make it out, it would be just barely.

“NOT REALLY, NO!”

“STOP SHOUTING!” Zelda commanded. She took a deep breath. “Ryan, you have a lot of experience with forest fires. Should it be spreading this quickly?”

“DOES IT MATTER?!” Patrick asked, completely ignoring Zelda’s request that they all not scream at each other. “IT IS SPREADING THIS QUICKLY, SO THERE’S NOT MUCH WE CAN DO ABOUT IT RIGHT NOW!”

Suddenly, there was a wall of shadows around the Humvee, which Ryan was grateful for because it blocked out the heat and would presumably stop them from being burned alive, but also inconvenient because Ryan /couldn’t see where he was going/. He just kept going, trying to keep the steering wheel as straight as he could, hoping that Josh could tell when the flames weren’t surrounding them anymore so he could drop it.

What may have been only a couple minutes and may have been close to an hour, the shadows dissipated from around them, and the flames were behind them, consuming the trees.

“Thanks, Josh,” Ryan said, taking a moment to recompose himself. He was still pushing the Humvee as fast as it could go, trying to put as much distance between them and Blurryface as they could.

“He’s unconscious again,” Joe piped up from his spot in the back. “But I’m sure he knows we’re grateful.”

There was a moment of silence as they all tried to compose themselves before Andy spoke up.

“What next?”

* * *

“Josh said that Blurryface could track him,” Ryan was saying, as he and Brendon laid Josh down onto the ratty couch. They’d driven until they found an old house that still looked intact. There was nobody inside, it didn’t smell heavily of death, and there were some cans of food and bottles of water in the cabinets. Andy thought it was probably a trap, but the appeal of food, water, and shelter outweighed all other rational thought. “So there’s not really a use in covering our tracks.”

“So, what?” Pete asked, coming out with a handful of cans. “We just sit here and hope that they don’t come after us? Last time we did that, we almost burned to death.”

“At least hope that Josh wakes up before they do,” Andy offered. “All we’ve had since we started was hope, Pete. That’s all we’ll have until we manage to stop him for good.”

“Or until we die,” Brendon muttered. He glanced around at everybody staring at him. “Sorry I’m not over the however fucking long it is we spent thinking we were going to die,” he snapped. “We still might die. I’m tired of this childish fucking optimism.”

Pete, who had been distributing the cans to everybody, suddenly shoved one of the cans into Brendon’s gut, knocking an _oof_  out of him. Andy was glad that Pete had shut him up, but at the same time…

They were in a bit of a useless state after the time they spent in that treehouse—mentally and physically. The atmosphere in that wooden treetop prison was thicker than any Andy had ever experienced, heavier than the gloom that had settled over Pete’s hospital room back in 2005. When Josh had taken Patrick, Pete’s screams were the only thing Andy could hear, and they hurt him more than anything that he could imagine waiting for them on the forest floor. By the time that Josh had gotten to Andy, he had been so resigned to death that he didn’t just refuse to fight—he didn’t even see a point to the attempt.

And here they were now, still alive, by some miracle, but Brendon brought up an excellent point. It was a miracle that they were alive, and every second past this point was going to be another miracle. So, really, what was the point?

Saving Tyler? Sure, of course Tyler was important. Andy may only be a drummer, but he could appreciate the other members of a band, and Tyler was a musical powerhouse. Plenty of bands and performers were only one or two in studio, but they found backup in other people for their live shows. But Tyler and Josh were just that—Tyler and Josh, and no-one else. Not to mention that their friendship was something that not even Andy—who’d been in a band with Pete and Patrick for practically the entirety of the twenty-first century—had ever seen before. But, really, what chance did they have?

Why give their lives to a cause that was bound to fail, when they could turn around and leave now, go west to LA, north from there to Portland, east from there to Chicago, and further east from there to New York?

They were probably going to die anyway. Why not die with their families, with their friends?

* * *

Josh woke slowly, blinking the sleep from his eyes and trying to clear his head of its fogginess. He didn’t recognize where he was at first, and when he did, he was very confused.

He was in Tyler’s room, pinned against the wall by a dresser, with Jenna rapidly losing consciousness beside him. He stared at Jenna in confusion before Blurryface spoke.

“It’s a dream, Joshie.” He sounded exasperated. “Now, I like to think that I’ve been kind to you. I mean, sure, I’m possessing your best friend, killed your best friend's wife and your other best friend, tried to kill a long list of your other friends, and brought the apocalypse upon the world you live in, but none of that was _personal_ , Joshie, it was just _business_. I thought you understood!”

Josh stared at Blurryface blankly. “You really think I was helping you because I wanted to see Tyler torn to pieces inside his own head?”

Blurryface waved a hand dismissively. “No, of course not, I knew from the beginning you were going to try to help him. Of course, you were really just setting yourself up for failure, right from the beginning, but I mean. As long as _Tyler_  thought you were helping me, I didn’t actually care.”

Well, Josh could at least say he tried.

“Of course, now that he _knows_  you only ever wanted to help him, I’m going to have to kill you. All of you. At least you can draw comfort from the fact that—”

He cut himself off suddenly, hunching over and grasping his head in pain. “You…little…” he gasped out, before he looked up at Josh with brown eyes that Josh hadn’t seen since the official fall of the world.

“Release them, Josh!” Tyler shouted, before letting out a pained scream. “It’s how…tracks you!”

His eyes turned red again, and Blurryface looked angrier than Josh had ever seen him. “If you were smart, _Joshie_ , you would ignore what just happened,” he hissed, and Josh felt the dresser press deeper into his ribs. For a dream, the pain was very real.

He refused to scream, though. He hadn’t screamed in this room in real life, and he wasn’t going to scream now.

He woke with a start, the last thing he saw before doing so was Blurryface’s eyes flickering back to Tyler’s brown, very briefly.

“Josh, whoa, hey, calm down,” Brendon implored, as Josh flailed so hard he fell off the couch he hadn’t realized he was on.

“I know how to throw off Blurryface,” he said, shaking his head to clear it. “And I think I might know how to save Tyler, too.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Fortunately, Josh is an idiot, and will not be forgetting what he just saw.
> 
> Man, I love October. Halloween, sweater weather, Halloween, colorful leaves, Halloween, my birthday, HALLOWEEN. Wait, hang on. I live in the South. It's in the 70s and the pine trees stay green all year round. HALLOWEEN THO.
> 
> pyromanicschizophrenic.tumblr.com


	22. Just One Mistake is All it Will Take

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Ryan hates this plan.

"I don’t like this,” Ryan said, for what must have been the hundredth time.

“We know,” Brendon responded, also for the hundredth time.

“It’s just…You said that he told you they answer to Blurryface too, right?” Ryan checked. Again. “Which means that if _h_ _e_  tells them to kill us, can Josh really stop them?”

“We’re just going to have to be prepared for that,” Zelda replied calmly, staring at herself in the mirror.

Dallon had caught sight of himself in the mirror for exactly two seconds before he started actively avoiding his reflection. He knew he shouldn’t have been as surprised as he was—they were all covered in dirt, blood, and grass stains; they were all gaunt and haggard, but Dallon didn’t like the way that if he hadn’t known before that it was a mirror there’s no way he would have ever recognized himself. It was eye-opening, because now, looking at everybody in his group, he only recognized them because he’d watched their ‘transformation.’

It made him realize that -if- _when_  he got home to his family…

They may not recognize him either.

“There is no _preparing_  for them trying to kill us!” Ryan argued, drawing Dallon out of his head, but he wasn’t sure that a repeat of an argument he’d heard every twenty minutes was really all that much better.

“Ryan,” he said tiredly, finally deciding to step in. “We get it. They’re dangerous. But there isn’t—”

“You _don’t_  get it!” Ryan interrupted. “You have not _seen_  what these things are capable of when they want to do you harm. The first time you all met the Shadows, it just wanted to lead you to exactly where you wanted to go. The second time, it was Josh, saving us. If Josh does this, if he’s successful or if he’s not, they will _kill_  us, and they will not fail. So don’t you dare tell me that you understand what is at stake here, because you do not.” Ryan’s hands were shaking, and his breathing was ragged.

“Ryan?” Brendon asked slowly, as if consoling a frightened animal. “Ryan, what happened to you?”

Ryan looked at Brendon, but Dallon thought maybe _through him_  would be a better description. He looked deep in thought, lost in his past, and Dallon wasn’t sure if he’d be able to handle whatever he was about to say.

“It was…” Ryan trailed off, as if searching for the words. “Shadows don’t burn.”

Dallon’s brow furrowed, and he could see everybody else’s do the same.

“Right,” Andy agreed slowly.

“Everything else, they burn,” Ryan continued, as if trying to explain himself. Dallon didn’t really think he was doing a very good job. “Maybe not the most conventional ways to deal with all of them, but everything burns. Except for the Shadows.”

“And…what do the shadows do, Ryan?” Patrick asked, but he sounded like he already knew.

“You’ve seen it,” Ryan stated. “The barricade of cars. Ripping the trailer to shreds. Tearing off one side of the treehouse. They look like shadows, may be made of shadows, but they’re not the shadows cast by normal things.”

“Darkness demons,” Josh interrupted. “That’s what he called them. ‘They hide in the darkness behind the light,’ he said. ‘And when your back is turned, they strike.’ He gave me control over them to reward me for choosing to help him.”

“What, letting you live wasn’t reward enough?” Pete asked sardonically.

“He said it was no good if the only reason for me to help him was that I wouldn’t die,” Josh explained. “And I would have rather died than actually help him anyway.”

“Why wouldn’t it have been any good?” Patrick asked.

“Because Tyler would have understood,” Josh explained. “He’d have understood that I had to help him so that I could survive. He’s trying to completely and utterly destroy Tyler, and there is nothing more painful than your best friend _willingly_  helping him do it.”

“So you got control over these…darkness demon…things, because you agreed to help Blurryface, but you only really did that so you could help _Tyler_ , except now you’ve found out that the darkness demon shadow things are how Blurryface is tracking you, and if you release your control over them he can’t track you anymore?” Joe summed up.

Josh nodded. “Yeah, that’s about it.”

“And how do you know that releasing control over them will work?” Joe asked.

“Because…” Josh trailed off, then started again. “I had this dream. And Blurryface told me that he knew what I was trying to do all along, but since Tyler didn’t know that he didn’t care. And he was about to tell me all about how he planned to kill us, when Tyler…Tyler fought back. He came back just long enough to tell me that I needed to release them.”

“A demon visited you in a dream and in that dream you found out the way to keep him from finding you was to relinquish your control over the best thing we could possibly use to defend ourselves from that same demon, who wants to kill us all very violently,” Zelda surmised.

Josh blinked. Dallon had to admit, it didn’t sound very good when put like that.

“You…It _was_  Tyler,” Josh defended himself. “I know how it sounds, but…”

“I believe you,” Patrick interrupted. Dallon noticed he was looking straight at Pete. “Sometimes you can just tell.”

“Okay, this is all well and good,” Ryan started, “but if Josh—”

“Ryan,” Brendon said tiredly. “Drop it.”

* * *

“We shouldn’t do this here,” Zelda said suddenly, staring out the window. They were all taking turns watching out for any sign that Blurryface and his ‘friends’ were coming. So far, there’d been nothing. Personally, Joe felt that if Blurryface and his goons came, the way to tell would not be seeing them ambling down the street.

“Do what where?” Joe asked, carefully testing his bad leg. He desperately needed for it to not be useless.

“Release them,” Zelda explained.

“Not you too,” Pete mumbled. “Whatever happened to—”

“He can _track us_ ,” Zelda interrupted. “Which means he probably knows we’re here, which means that if Josh _does_  release them, and Josh is right about all this, then this is the first place he’s going to show up, because once we leave here we’re untraceable, and he’ll want to block us off before we go too far.”

“Great,” Ryan piped up from his spot at the foot of the stairs— _stairs!_  Joe thought ecstatically. He couldn’t climb them, but Josh and Dallon had gone up there a few minutes ago—where he had previously sat staring wistfully at the bookshelf directly in front of him. Even in the apocalypse, more than half a decade after Joe had last seen him, Ryan Ross was still Ryan Ross. “An even better reason for Josh not to—”

“We just need to be ready to run when he does it,” Brendon interrupted Ryan, because seriously, nobody wanted to hear Ryan go off again on how he didn’t like the plan. “Get as far from here as we possibly can.”

“We still have that Humvee,” Joe pointed out. There was also a minivan and a pickup truck in the garage, if they thought either of those would be better than an armored military combat vehicle. “And this is the most prepared we’ve been to run for our lives so far.”

“There’s just one thing I don’t get,” Patrick said thoughtfully, picking at the threadbare arm of the couch. “Why are we still here?”

“Uh…Because we’re safer here than out in the open?” Pete supplied, eyeing Patrick worriedly.

“Arguably,” Ryan mumbled.

“If he can track us, then he knows we’re here,” Patrick reminded them.

“Yes, we’ve just been discussing that,” Joe agreed. Patrick wasn’t making much sense.

“Your leg’s still shot to hell, Josh is in a severely weakened state from over-using his powers that we didn’t even know he had, and all of us— _all of us_ —barely got here alive, because we were malnourished and barely above hypothermic and had no will to live anyway. Why _l_ _eave us here_ , to get better, to get _free_?”

“False hope?” Andy pointed out.

But that didn’t sound right. Not quite.

Maybe it would have, before Josh had his dream, but there’s no way that Blurryface would let them be for as long as he had _after_  Josh had found out the way for them all to survive this. Unless…

“Okay, this is going to sound entirely crazy,” Joe started, because he hadn’t even figured out for himself what his theory was, but he knew it was crazy. “But what if Blurryface _doesn’t_  know where we are?”

“You’re right,” Andy agreed. “It does sound entirely crazy.”

“No, but…Okay, listen. Josh said that Blurryface knew what he was planning, but Tyler didn’t. Either Blurryface was bluffing and didn’t actually know what Josh was planning, or he knows how to hide things from Tyler. He knows how to _lie_  to Tyler. So if he made _Tyler_  think that he can track Josh using Josh’s control over the creepy shadow things, _of course_  Tyler’s going to try and warn him.” Joe wasn’t sure how much sense that made, but he’d at least figured out what he was trying to say for himself.

“Which brings us back to not letting him do it!” Ryan exclaimed. That boy was really starting to sound like a broken record.

“That would imply that Blurryface expected Tyler to be able to break free for a moment,” Patrick pointed out.

“Or it wasn’t Tyler,” Andy reminded him.

“I trust Josh’s judgment,” Pete argued.

“Or Blurryface let Tyler out,” Zelda offered. “Make him think he was still putting up a fight for authenticity’s sake, but let Tyler free long enough for him to tell Josh exactly what Josh needs to hear.”

Joe’s head hurt. He started to wish he hadn’t said anything.

“Blurryface’s plan seems fairly specific,” Ryan pointed out. “And he doesn’t really strike me as the type to just bank on the action heroes to be total idiots.”

“Which is a shame,” Pete interrupted. “Because we’re totally the moronic action heroes.”

Patrick hit him. Joe was glad, because he didn’t feel like crossing the room.

“So you’re saying he had contingencies,” Zelda summed up, ignoring Pete entirely.

Ryan nodded. “Just in case, somehow, Tyler was able to fight back. He had to make sure that he didn’t spill anything important.”

“Which really does bring us back to ‘don’t let Josh relinquish control over the creepy shadow things,’” Joe surmised.

Ryan didn’t gloat, didn’t say _I told you so_ , but he did look a bit more smug than usual.

“You know,” Josh said from the top of the stairs, where he and Dallon had been standing for God-knows-how-long, watching the proceedings. “You know, I could always just ask them.”

* * *

For what it’s worth, Ryan fucking hated this plan. The _new_  plan was to have Josh summon a Shadow and fucking _interrogate_  it. If the Shadows served Josh _after_  they served Blurryface, then chances are they’d be lying to him. Which means, sure. They’ll _tell_  Josh that of course that’s how he tracks you, _of course_  all you have to do is relinquish your control over us.

And then they’ll kill all of them.

“Okay,” Brendon started, sitting down beside Ryan on the bed. They were upstairs, in one of the old bedrooms. “I know that there’s a lot of problems with this plan. I know that there were a lot of problems with the old plan.”

“You all keep saying that,” Ryan muttered, staring out the window from the sliver between the curtains. “But you’re still advocating for it.”

“Would you like me to tell you a story?” Brendon asked.

“If it’s the plot of a Disney movie, I’m going to kill you myself,” Ryan threatened.

Brendon snorted a laugh. If Ryan was going to die, he was glad that he and Brendon were on speaking terms again. He only wished that Spencer…He wished he’d have been able to apologize to Spencer, too.

“Once upon a time,” Brendon started, voice doing that dreamy thing that he used to do when he was making fun of Ryan’s romantic tendencies. “Fall Out Boy was playing a show, in DC. And some creepy ass grey skinned zombies attacked from backstage. And then there was this girl there, who saved them all and lead them to a church, which they used as their safehouse.

“I was playing a show too, somewhere else. I don’t know whose idea that was, actually, to have us both playing a show in the same area at the same time, but that’s no the point. We had these creepy ass grey skinned zombie things, too, but they were apparently different kinds.

“I was…I wasn’t paying attention. I had my in-ear out, I was lost in the sound of the crowd, and…You know what I used to be like. I haven't really changed, at least not there. Not on stage. And then one of the things, it had gotten to Kenny, and…I just stared. I knew that I had to run, but I couldn’t get my feet to move. Dallon grabbed me by my arm, practically dragged me away until I could get my feet to work again. They’d already gotten Dan, and I could kind of hear Zack shouting, but I was so out of it, I’m not sure what he was saying.”

Ryan had figured that if Zack wasn’t with Brendon, then t was because something had already gotten to him, but he’d rather not have it practically spelled out for him.

“We got far enough away from them, ducked into an alley so that we could breath. I had my phone, thankfully, and I did the only thing I could think to do at the time. I texted Pete. And Pete told me where they were, told me that we could go over there, and we did. We were promptly threatened, because Zelda doesn’t take kindly to intruders, or to Pete, but we _were_  safe. And among friends.”

“One of whom had apparently taken it upon himself to piss Zelda off as often as possible,” Ryan pointed out. He’d heard all about Pete’s antagonistic behavior.

Brendon shrugged. “We weren’t used to all this…this Survivor stuff,” he pointed out. “She was all ‘follow me’ and ‘don’t ask questions’ and ‘emotions are for the weak,’ and it’s Pete. He doesn’t follow anyone, he questions everything, and he wears his heart on his sleeve.”

“Anyway, we had a supply run, and on the way out, there were Brawlers—the ones that attacked me and Dallon, the ones that killed Dan and Kenny, ripped them apart…they were everywhere, Ryan.” Brendon had a haunted look in his eye; Ryan remembered, suddenly, that he’d been through his own hell in the months since the world ended. “I almost turned back around and just hid in the store until they’d disappeared. I just…When I saw them, it was like I was seeing the stage again, hearing the screams all over, and…”

“It was too much,” Ryan finished for him.

Brendon nodded. “When we left, started out for this way, we stopped in a mall for clothes and bags and stuff. We’d split into groups to get more stuff more quickly, and all of us ended up cornered. Andy and I were fine, we just had some Pawns. It didn’t take us long to get away from them. Zelda came up, told us where Pete and Dallon were, and she just ran off for where Patrick and Joe were.”

Ryan watched quietly. He’d already heard what came next. Brendon was staring towards the window, but he didn’t really seem to be paying any attention to it.

“I get it, that something happened with you and the Shadows,” Brendon continued softly. “And I get that it makes you terrified to face them again, with the stakes much higher and a massive risk of them trying to kill us. But there’s nothing else we can do, unless you want to waste away in this house. And let me tell you, you will be all alone in that choice, because I _am_  going to get back to LA, Dallon and Pete are going to get back to LA, Patrick’s going back to Chicago, Joe’s going back to New York, and Andy’s going back to Oregon. Josh is going to save Tyler. Maybe you’ll get Zelda to wither away here with you, but given that she just found out that she’s been working for the thing that had her…” Brendon stopped, seeming to realize that if Ryan didn’t already know then it was because she didn’t want him to know. “Had someone very important to her killed, I doubt she’ll be willing to just sit around here and wait for nothing to happen.”

“They skin you alive,” Ryan said finally, letting the memories resurface. “Peel away each layer of skin, each layer of muscle, they keep you alive through all of it. And then they slowly slice your veins open, let you bleed out slowly.” The sounds of the screams never stopped haunting him; he had doubts they ever would. “I’m glad I found you, honestly,” he admitted, after Brendon made it clear that he had nothing more to say. “Who knows how crazy I would have gone on my own?”

“I’m sure Zelda has some sort of a clue,” Brendon pointed out. “She wasn’t exactly all there when we met. Of course, she’s probably not all there now, it’s just harder for us to tell because we also have lost many pieces.”

“You were never all there,” Ryan shot back, but there was no venom to it.

“Oh, and you were?” Brendon countered immediately. Ryan smiled; he’d missed this. He hoped that they both made it out of this, and he hoped that they found Spencer alive and well himself. He’d missed his friends.

“Josh is about to summon them,” Pete announced, appearing suddenly in the doorway. “Zelda wants us all together, ready to run in case it goes south.”

_In case_  seemed highly optimistic to Ryan, but at least he didn’t have to worry about dying alone anymore.

* * *

“I only needed one of you.” Josh was surprised by how even his voice sounded. He was absolutely terrified, but his voice didn’t seem to betray it at all.

“We know.”

There were three of them, all identical, and they were speaking in unison. Josh hated it when they did that.

“Only one of you talk aloud,” he ordered. “The others can stay, but you aren’t going to do that unison thing.”

“Very well.” Center one. Josh could do this.

“I have a few questions. And you’re going to answer them completely honestly.” Josh took a deep breath. “Does Blurryface know where I am?”

“Not exactly.” Right.

“What does that mean?”

“He knows you are in this area. He does not know more than that.” Left. Josh could feel the way that the others were staring at him, could feel the tension their nerves caused. Or maybe that was him. They were all ready to run for it.

“Is he tracking me using my power over you?” Josh asked after a moment to gather his thoughts.

There was a pause.

“Answer me,” Josh commanded.

“He is.” Left again.

“If I release my hold over you, can me and my friends escape him?”

“No. He has set a perimeter around the area he knows you to be hiding in.” Center.

“They will kill you before you make it two miles in any direction.” Right.

“Can you run them off?”

“He will not allow us to.” Center.

Josh wracked his brain. There had to be something they could do, some other option.

“What exactly is it that makes him able to track me?” Josh questioned finally.

All three girls grinned. Josh felt the hairs on the back of his neck stand on end.

“We are bound to two Masters,” they said together.

“Who guards the perimeter?” Josh demanded.

“Pawns.” Center.

“We can escape Pawns,” Joe said hesitantly.

They could. Josh didn’t understand why Blurryface would only use them to make sure they didn’t escape.

“Anything else?”

“No.”

Josh knew. He knew that this was dangerous. But there was hardly any other choice. They could fight off enough Pawns to get away from the area Blurryface knew that they were in, they could get away and hide until they had a better plan.

Right now, this was the best plan.

“How do I release you?” Josh asked quietly.

“You must say you release us from the lesser Master.” All three.

“Alright.” Josh braced himself for the worst. He knew what they were capable of, in case their orders from Blurryface were to attack immediately. “Then I do. I release you from your lesser Master.” He shut his eyes, prepared for the pain.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Okay, so I was a day late. Oh fucking well. I mean, it's not like it's the first time, it's certainly not the _last_ time. We all make mistakes, okay?
> 
> I'm almost done. I'm working on the last chapter. I'm crying a lot. We'll get through it together. There's a lizard in my bedroom and I'm too tired to move him. Almost done. Almost there.


	23. Chapter 23

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Okay, so I wasn't sure before but being late two chapters in a row, I'm definitely moving to weekly updates, with update days being anywhere between Thursday through Sunday because I have lost control of my internal calendar, and since I no longer need the two week buffer zone for actually WRITING this damn thing I'm going to treat you lovelies. Anyway, ONWARDS!

At least Pete had been watching _most_  of the exchange. Unlike Ryan, who’d closed his eyes almost as soon as the girls showed up. They’d all closed their eyes at varying points in the conversation between Josh and the Shadow-girls, but Pete had kept his eyes open until almost the very end. But when they told Josh how to release them, Pete only edged closer to Patrick and squeezed his eyes shut.

Nothing happened, at first. There was tense anticipation for two seconds, which felt like an eternity each, before Zelda hesitantly said, “Uh…guys?”

Then there was an, “Oh, shit,” from Brendon and a

“But how?” from Ryan and a nervous laugh from Josh. And Pete opened his eyes.

The room was swirling with shadows, so thick that Pete really may as well have kept his eyes closed for all the light that was getting into the room. In the center of the shadows was Josh, staring down at the three creepy girls in shock. Except the three creepy girls weren’t trying to kill them, the shadows weren’t attacking them…

The girls were kneeling. The shadows were _yielding._

“Well,” Patrick started, in a strangled sort of voice. “This went better than expected.”

“This is a trick, right?” Josh asked.

“It is not,” the center girl replied, still kneeling in the sort of bow that Pete had seen in all kinds of shows and movies—a subject to its king.

“Why would you tell me if it was?” Josh demanded. “You don’t answer to me anymore, you can lie all you want!”

“Josh…” Andy tried uneasily. Pete could tell that he didn’t really understand what exactly was happening here—none of them did. “Josh, I think…I think they’re telling the truth.”

That’s exactly what Pete thought. There was something in the way that they’d answered all of Josh’s questions that gave the impression that they were trying to say that Josh was higher in their hierarchy than Blurryface was—because he doubted that Blurryface would have wanted Josh to know that. And they had needed to obey both of them.

“The demon granted you full control,” the girl on the right said, as if that explained everything.

“You have freed us from hell’s control,” the center girl continued. “We answer to you and to you alone, Joshua Dun.”

Josh laughed nervously again, looking back and forth between the three girls still kneeling and Pete and the others. Pete could tell he was uncomfortable, out of his element. Scared. They couldn’t be tracked by Blurryface anymore, but now it felt like the target on their backs was bigger than ever.

“I don’t _want_  you to answer to me!” Josh snapped. “I just want to save Tyler, that’s it!”

“Josh, wait,” Joe cut in suddenly. “Josh, this is a good thing.”

“No it isn’t!” Josh argued. “Do you really think that he didn’t know about this? He doesn’t do _anything_  inadvertently, he just wants us to _think_  that he messed up, and we’ll plan out this whole huge ambush and then they—” he pointed to the girls, “will turn around and _kill_  us and Tyler will still be possessed, except there will be nobody around to save him anymore!”

“Nobody chooses who our lesser Master is,” the center girl stated calmly. “We choose for ourselves. We have chosen you.”

“And why would you do _that_?” Josh demanded.

“We do not want this world to end,” they said together. “We do not wish to destroy it. We do not wish to kill.”

“Well why didn’t you just _say_  so in the first place?” Pete was starting to get worried about Josh—he looked ready to pass out again, but from shock instead of exhaustion. Josh turned to the rest of them. “They don’t want to kill, guys,” he repeated. “You hear that, Ryan Ross? They didn’t _wish_  to kill your friends!”

Pete glanced over to Ryan, who was staring at the girls with the kind of rage he’d only been told about in the wake of Panic’s split.

“We were under a demon’s control,” the girl on the left explained, not noticing how angry Ryan looked, how hysterical Josh was, how scared the rest of them were. “As were you, though you did not know it.”

“Go,” Josh said darkly, finally seeming to gain back some control over himself. When the girls didn’t budge, he raised his voice. “I said _go_.”

The room seemed to buzz with a kind of power Pete could have missed if he wasn’t paying attention to every single detail going on, and the girls were gone, the room brighter for their presence.

“I think we should get some rest,” Zelda piped up after a few tense seconds of blank staring. Everybody nodded and dispersed; even Pete had to agree that some rest sounded like a good idea.

* * *

“Do you think Josh did the right thing?” Joe asked quietly, speaking into the soft light from the weak moon shining into the window.

Andy shrugged. He was staring outside, on the lookout for Blurryface or any of the creatures they knew to be in his command. To tell the truth, he wasn’t entirely sure that Josh had done the right thing at all; it didn’t seem to fit in with Blurryface’s plan, to give them even more time to come up with a solid plan to stop him. But Josh had just found out that he was in sole command of a terrifying army of demons, so Andy figured he just needed time.

“Do you think those shadow things could take us all home?” Again, Joe was barely speaking above a whisper, but this time, he asked the million dollar question.

“I think they’ll do whatever Josh tells them to,” Andy answered, just as softly. “But I don’t think he’s going to be summoning them or commanding them anytime soon. Not until he accepts that he’s in control of them.”

“But then he’s going to want to save Tyler,” Joe pointed out. He didn’t sound angry about it, or hurt; just resigned. Of course once Josh accepted that the Shadows weren’t lying to him, he was going to want to save his best friend. That’s what Andy would have done.

And, at any rate, they’d all promised Josh that they’d help him save Tyler anyway. That’s not a promise that they’d be able to go back on—Tyler was, after all, their friend. The only two who didn’t actually know him were Zelda and Ryan, and Zelda was probably furious enough at being played that there was no way she’d leave without helping to stop Blurryface.

“He may still be in control of them after we send Blurryface back to hell,” Andy started slowly. It was important to note that this was only a possibility, and a very slim one at that.

“And if he is, then he’d probably help us get home.”

“If the Shadows are hanging around after Blurryface is gone, then that probably means everything else hangs around too,” Joe reminded him.

“Blurryface controls everything else. Josh controls the Shadows.” Andy still wasn’t sure of the chances of the Shadows hanging around, but if they did, they’d be under Josh’s control. If anything else stayed, it’d be without any control, and the Shadows were powerful enough that Andy felt confident they could clean up the mess with little to no effort.

Joe didn’t say anything after that, and Andy began to think he’d finally fallen asleep. He kept staring out the window, thinking about Tyler, about Josh, about Fuck City and how they were faring, about the rest of his band, about Brendon and Dallon and Ryan, about where Zelda would go when this was all over. He wondered if any of them had spent enough time thinking about Zelda; she’d said before, many times, that she had no home to go back to. And who would recognize her if she had? Who would recognize _them_  when they got home?

Who would they be able to recognize?

“We never should have left to play that show,” Joe lamented. Andy couldn't agree more.

The sky started to turn a light grey from the rising sun.

* * *

Brendon didn’t like the way that everything was starting to appear to be turning in his favor. It wasn’t necessarily that he agreed with Josh—that the Shadows had been commanded by Blurryface to pretend to be answering solely to Josh now—but he was certainly suspicious. If the Shadows were actually on their side, then the fight could well be over before it started. Just like that. They’d have won.

“It can’t be this easy,” he muttered, staring at the poster on the wall of the bedroom he, Ryan, and Dallon were sharing. It was a Doctor Who poster, which Dallon had nodded at approvingly before collapsing onto one of the two beds furnishing the room.

“Never is,” Ryan pointed out, causing Brendon to jump. He’d thought he was the only one still awake. “Even before everything went to shit, it was never this easy.” Brendon heard the squeak of the bedsprings before joining Brendon on the floor. “They didn’t want to kill them.”

Brendon shook his head. “That’s what they said,” he agreed. “Do you believe them?”

“I want to,” Ryan said. “But I don’t know if I can.” Neither of them said anything; Brendon didn’t even know what he should be saying, if he should be saying anything at all.

“If they weren’t lying,” Brendon started hesitantly. “If they were telling the truth.”

“It would be us against Blurryface,” Ryan finished. “They could handle everything else Blurryface would be throwing at us, and they’d probably be able to help us with him, too.”

“It’d be over,” Brendon surmised.

Ryan hummed thoughtfully. “No, I don’t think so,” he said. “I think there’d still be a fight between us and Blurryface, one that we don’t want the Shadows involved in. Especially if we still want to save Tyler.”

“Of course we want to save Tyler,” Brendon snapped. _Why wouldn’t we still want to save Tyler?_

“That wasn’t a question, Bren,” Ryan replied calmly. “I’m just not sure how useful the Shadows would be at getting rid of Blurryface without seriously injuring Tyler in the process. It’ll be us against him.”

“Us against him without the Pawns, Brawlers, Brigade, or Shepherds sounds a lot better than us against all of them,” Brendon allowed. “Like maybe we won’t be torn to pieces.”

“Yeah,” Ryan agreed. “The odds may not be in our favor, but they’re more in our favor that they could be.”

The fight wouldn’t be over before it started. It’d just be on much more even footing.

But only if the Shadows weren’t lying about Josh being their sole commander.

* * *

“They’re lying.”

Patrick sighed, more tired of this argument with Josh than he’d been with Ryan’s earlier _bad idea_  arguments. And he had been thoroughly fed up with Ryan while he was trying to convince them all that they were doing the wrong thing.

“You don’t know that,” Pete countered. “Just like Ryan didn’t know that they’d kill us.”

“Well, I mean, Ryan did know that,” Patrick pointed out. “He’s seen what they’re capable of.”

“We are not dead,” Pete reminded him. “And so your argument is invalid.”

“Pete, listen to me,” Josh pleaded. “These things, they don’t think for themselves. They follow orders, that’s it. They don't get to just decide that they want to follow me over following Blurryface, they lack the higher cognitive function. Everything in Blurryface’s control has no power to think for themselves, he told me that he can’t stand it when he can’t be certain that he’ll be obeyed. And you can’t tell me that’s a lie, because he has every right to want everything to be mindless slaves. Look at me.” Josh took a deep breath, and Patrick saw that he looked close to tears. “The Shadows, or Darkness Demons, whichever you want to call them, they aren’t on our side just because they _say_  they are. I need…I need proof. _We_  need proof. Otherwise, we’re just falling for Blurryface’s trap.”

“Josh,” Patrick said softly. “Josh, if you want to wait for proof, then there’s hardly any hope for Tyler.” He ignored Pete’s sharp glare. “Because if you’re right, and they’re not on our side, then that means that Blurryface could be here any minute. And we will be dead without putting up any kind of fight, without _really_  trying to do anything. But if we try to use the Shadows, and we’re wrong and you’re right, then yes, okay, Tyler has to watch us all die. But he gets to watch us die trying to save him. And that might be just what he’ll need to get free.”

Josh blinked owlishly at him. “What…What do you mean?”

“You said Tyler briefly regained control in your dream, right?” Patrick checked. He saw Pete’s eyes widen in realization out of the corner of his eye, but kept his focus trained on Josh, who nodded. “After Blurryface said he knew you were helping _Tyler_ , right?”

“You think…” Josh trailed off, staring at Patrick and Pete blankly.

“We think you gave Tyler hope,” Pete explained. “And we think that might be exactly what he needs to fight Blurryface off.”

“We don’t need to beat him, Josh,” Patrick concluded. “We just need to survive and fight, and give Tyler the strength to come back to us.”

Josh looked down at the ground, looking deep in thought. “We still might die,” he said finally.

Pete shrugged. “I’ve almost died so many times since the show in DC, man. Really, nothing scares me anymore.”

“Nothing scared you to _begin_  with,” Patrick muttered in exasperation. Pete just grinned at him.

“Okay,” Josh agreed finally. “Okay, fine. We’ll talk to everyone else in the morning. We’ll come up with a concrete plan, and a very concrete back-up plan. Fight as hard as we can and try to survive all at once.”

“Sounds like a plan already,” Pete said with a broad grin. “Same plan we’ve had since we left DC.”

Patrick hit him, but Josh was actually smiling, so there was very little heat to it.

* * *

“You’re telling me that the entire plan now hinges on _hope_?” Zelda demanded.

“It always hinged on hope,” Pete reminded her harshly. “Hope for survival, hope for an end, hope for our _families_. Hope that those Shadow things weren’t going to kill us the second Josh released them from his control.”

“In case you’ve forgotten,” Zelda snapped, “Blurryface is very good at sapping people of hope. And you all want to give Tyler—the person that Blurryface is _possessing_ —enough hope to be able to fight back. Your entire plan is working under the assumption that Tyler Joseph still knows the meaning of the word.”

“Alright, you know what?” It was, surprisingly, Dallon that spoke. Zelda turned to look at him, practically daring him to continue. “I know that we’re in the apocalypse, and so this whole dark and cynical attitude of yours makes _sense_. You were alone for a long time, you fell in love and watched him torn apart, you’ve had to put up with _Pete_  of all people for what must have been at least half a year, you found out that you’ve been taking orders from the same person that’s destroying the world, and all of that is a lot of _terrible_  things to be going through.

“But this is our plan, and it is the _only_  one that we have, it is the _best_  one we have. It is the best bet to stop Blurryface _and_  save Tyler. I don’t care if you think it’s stupid, or that we’re wasting our time, if you think we’re just going to _die_  and it won’t even be worth it. Because at least we _tried._ And when we’re done _trying,_ if we _survive,_ we’re going home to our families, which is what we should have done in the _first place_. I am _done_  listening to you, I am done letting you tell us what the next move is or what we _should_  be doing, because the _only_  thing you’ve done is kept us from the people we love and lead us into Blurryface’s trap.”

Zelda stared blankly at him, totally floored. She’d known that she’d fucked up when she saw it was Singer inside that cabin, known that everything she’d lead them through had been for absolutely nothing, known that none of them liked the way she was pushing them. But something about hearing it in Dallon’s voice and not Pete’s made it _click_  that she’d done more to _accidentally_  destroy any hope that they had than Blurryface had done wholly intentionally. She’d kept them from their families, and while they were being held in the treehouse, all of them had thought that they would die without ever getting to see them again. And that was on _her._

“I’ll be upstairs,” she said quietly. “I’ll help you all in any way I can, but I don’t think I’ll be any help with the planning.” She turned around and started walking up the stairs. About halfway up, she heard Pete say,

“Why’d she listen to you and not _me_?”

“Because you’re an asshole,” Patrick answered immediately.

* * *

“We thought you might like to hear what the plan is,” Dallon said hesitantly, watching Zelda warily. They were in the attic, Zelda sitting in one of the window alcoves staring blankly out at the world outside. Dallon himself was sitting on the floor, rubbing his hands together as if that would help the rawness from climbing up through the trapdoor.

(“There’s no ladder!”

“Dallon, you’re six-four, you don’t need a _ladder_.”)

“Surprised you were willing to come up here,” Zelda muttered, not looking away from the window.

“Everyone else was afraid of you. Except Pete, but he’s afraid of Patrick, and Patrick’s afraid enough for both of them.”

“I thought…” Zelda leaned her head against the window. “I thought I was doing the right thing. You were motivated, not seeing your families. If you all did whatever it was you were meant to do, you’d get home. Never, not once, did it occur to me that Singer only knew what he knew because he was behind all of this. I never once thought ‘Kansas is a trap, just take everybody home.’ And…And I’m sorry. We should have gone to New York, to Chicago, to Los Angeles. Not Kansas. Never Kansas.”

Dallon shook his head. The only reason he’d said any of the things he said in the living room was because he’d wanted Zelda to let them have their hope. Sure, he believed most of it, but not all of it.

“You’ve done more than keep us from our families,” he assured her softly. “So much more.”

“Enlighten me,” she requested. “Because from here it seems like I’ve done nothing but keep you from your families and lead you into a trap.”

“You’ve kept us alive,” Dallon started off. “We wouldn’t have made it out of the city if you hadn’t taught us to fight, and we’d have starved to death anyway. If you hadn’t taken us to Murdock, then I would have definitely died. Andy would have bled to death, if you hadn’t stitched up his arm.

“Ryan and Brendon are talking again. And Bren told me that if we all make it out of this, Ryan can rejoin our band. And if we don’t make it out of this, they’re on good terms again. And that’s not just good for them, trust me. that’s good for a lot of people, any fans of ours still out there, they will be so happy that Ryan Ross is playing guitar again.

“And Tyler. There wouldn’t be a plan to save him if you’d just taken us all home. We wouldn’t even know about Tyler. Josh would still be pretending to help Blurryface, and he probably would have ended up caught in that lie eventually, definitely ending up dead himself.

“We’re still going to try and save the world here,” Dallon concluded. “But without you that wouldn’t even be a possibility.”

Zelda finally turned to look at Dallon, looking more vulnerable and human than he’d ever seen her before. “What’s the plan?” she asked finally.

“Okay, but first, you have got to tell me how you got up here without a ladder,” Dallon requested. “Because you’re like, five-foot-nothing, and I’m over six foot and _I_  had trouble, so…”

Zelda smiled. It looked genuine. “I’m just better than you.”

Dallon smiled back. “We need you to find someone for us,” he told her. “And you’ll have to get her somewhere specific, no matter what.”

“I hear I’m good at that.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> (This is the "Surprisingly, Dallon" tumblr post from a while bak, if anyone was wondering.)
> 
> Oh man. _Oh man._ A lot's happening in the coming chapters. _OH MAN_
> 
> Follow on tumblr.pyromanicschizophrenic.com cuz I need more not-porn blogs in my follow list (unless you, dear reader, run a porn blog yourself. I'm not judging!)


	24. She's the Tear in Tyler Joseph's Heart

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This isn't meant to be a twist, they just didn't tell Zelda her name.

Zelda wasn’t sure how comfortable she felt in the Humvee, driving away from their shelter. She didn’t have a whole lot of supplies with her, she was going to have to stop somewhere and grab some before she found this person she was looking for. But it was kind of obvious that there was at least _one_  person Blurryface had personally targeted in the Humvee, since they were the only ones in the area that had one.

She had a ways to go, though, and she doubted the armored car was going to last her the trip there. She’d just have to find a car that worked on the way though, because Josh had been very adamant about finding this woman _quickly_. He’d also been adamant about making sure she didn’t get hurt any worse than she may have been when Zelda was able to track her down.

An atlas in the house they were staying in had shown that her destination wasn’t that far from the starting point, maybe about half a day, accounting for breaks and traffic. Zelda didn’t need breaks, and the roads were clear.

_“Here’s where we’re going to be facing down with Blurryface,” Pete had explained, pointing to a star drawn on an old and worn paper map. Apparently, without Zelda forcing herself into the role, Pete was a natural leader._

_“Does Josh just know that, or do you have a plan for how exactly you’re going to be put in charge of the venue?” she asked._

_“This is the first time the Shadows come in,” Josh explained. “They’re going to have to help us get there.”_

_“Most of us,” Dallon corrected. “Because you are going to be going separately.”_

_“You’ll have to meet us there,” Pete said. “Tyler’s already seen us, and probably already guessed we’re trying to fight for him. He needs something else.”_

The carnage from the forest fire flew by in a blur, making Zelda feel uncomfortable. She’d always known that Surviving meant you could die at any instant, but all she’d felt as Ryan drove them out of those trees was disappointment in herself for not being able to avenge Hunter. For getting killed by the same _thing_  that had given the order to kill him.

_“It won’t be easy,” Josh warned Zelda. “She’s lost a lot.”_

_“We all have,” Zelda reminded him._

_Josh shook his head. “Not as much as she has.”_

Zelda had no idea where everybody else was; if they were even taking the same route as she was or if they were going their own way. All she knew was that Josh had only given her a vague, “She should still be in Columbus.”

_“You don’t know where she is?” Zelda demanded._

_“I had to leave her behind when Blurryface moved to Lebanon,” Josh defended himself. “She stayed in Columbus while he was still pretending to be Tyler, it’s how I was able to check in on her between shows and tours.”_

_“But you couldn’t find a way to bring her with you?” Patrick asked. It sounded like this was the first any of them were hearing of this hole in their plan._

_“Not without force.”_

The sun started to rise, the light reflecting right into Zelda’s eyes. Without slowing the car down in the slightest, she put on the pair of sunglasses that Pete had taken back at Tyson’s Corner. She was pretty sure he knew by now that she’d taken them.

_“Without force?” Zelda repeated. “So basically, it has nothing to do with Blurryface, she just didn’t want to come.”_

_“Zelda, listen to me,” Josh implored. “We need you to_ convince _her to come. Her just being there won’t be good enough. She has to want to be there.”_

_“And if she won’t be convinced?” Brendon asked. “Josh, you told us what he did to her, what if—?”_

_“You all could have left Zelda at any point in time,” Josh interrupted. “She wasn’t keeping you all there, not technically. She convinced you to go with her.”_

_“We convinced each other,” Andy corrected uneasily._

_Josh shrugged. “Well, then we’ll just have to hope."_

“Always hoping,” Zelda muttered under her breath. The sun climbed higher, and the roads remained clear. No signs of anything that would try to kill her, try to stop her from making it to Columbus. Every now and then, she caught a glimpse of the Shadows, moving between the trees, but they never attacked either. So far, so good.

_“You’ll take the Humvee,” Pete said, handing Zelda the key. “Josh will send some Shadows with you. We want Blurryface to think that we’re the ones in the Humvee. We’ll take the minivan, a few hours after you’ve left.”_

_“We’ll have some Shadows with us, too,” Patrick added. “In case something comes after us too.”_

_“And if the Shadows are against us?” Zelda questioned._

_Josh shrugged. “I’m sure you’ll figure something out.”_

The sun slowly climbed higher in the sky, and nothing happened. Nothing attacked, the Shadows continued to flicker in and out of sight, the Humvee didn’t run out of gas.  
Zelda was getting nervous.

The trees ran out, turning to overgrown fields and dilapidated farmhouses, and it started to make Zelda wonder how much further she had to go.

There weren’t very many cars littering the road in this area, making it the worst possible place to run out of gas. So, naturally, that’s exactly where it happened.

“Fantastic,” she muttered, climbing out of the car. She made sure to grab the map and started walking, hoping to find another car before something attacked her. She felt far too exposed.

* * *

“That bitch took my sunglasses!” Pete exclaimed from the backseat of the van.

“How the hell did you manage to keep them for so long?” Brendon demanded.

Pete shrugged. “Determination.”

“I’m sure if you ask very nicely, she’ll give them back,” Ryan assured Pete, testing the limits to the van’s speed. The good news was that whoever owned it had kept the fuel tank near full. The bad news was that minivans had terrible mileage.

“Even if I ask nicely, she’ll probably only punch me in the face,” Pete muttered, leaning back into the seat.

“You’ll probably have deserved it,” Patrick replied, staring out the window at everything passing by. They were driving right through Illinois, but that there was too much at stake for him to ask them if they could just make a _tiny_  detour.

Everyone in the van made various noises of assent, except for Pete, who scowled. “I’m doing better,” he argued weakly.

“You punched her in the face,” Joe reminded him.

“To be fair, we did think she’d led us straight into a trap,” Andy defended Pete.

“Pete still punched her in the face,” Joe emphasized.

“And Dallon told her to fuck off,” Brendon added with a grin.

“Speaking of which,” Pete said, sounding like he was about to just _go off_  about injustice and unfairness and _why should Dallon not get himself almost murdered_  and to be honest, Patrick didn’t feel like hearing it. Even with their plan to give Tyler back everything to fight for that he’d thought Blurryface had taken, and their backup plan in case their first plan fell through, he felt like they were driving to their deaths.

“When you start off arguing, and fighting, it starts to look like you’re only arguing for the sake of arguing,” Patrick explained tiredly. “And I know, you weren’t. You genuinely believe in every single thing you’ve said to her, this entire time, but you wore Zelda’s patience down almost immediately. Dallon may not have agreed with everything she ever did, none of us ever agreed with her, but we understood that she was the way she was because that is where her circumstances led her. So when Dallon told her to fuck off, she heard someone who’d understood to an extent /stop/ understanding at all. And that means more than some loudmouth asshole just being a loudmouth asshole.”

“She still could have at least yelled at him,” Pete grumbled. “Instead, she just pulled a total 180 and completely dropped the subject.”

“Now you’re just asking us to figure out what’s in her head,” Josh piped up from the passenger seat. Patrick could see that he seemed to be concentrating pretty hard.

“Probably a running commentary about how much she wants to strangle Pete,” Brendon supplied.

“And you,” Dallon added. “She almost certainly wants to strangle you, too.”

“I almost died by strangulation,” Pete reminded them. “I’d rather we not joke about that.”

“But everything else is on the table,” Andy muttered.

Pete shrugged. “Gotta keep it interesting, man.”

“She just crossed city limits,” Josh announced suddenly. Patrick hadn’t realized that Josh was having the Shadows keep track of where Zelda was as well as protecting her.

“She made it this far before she had to change vehicles, too,” Ryan added. Patrick glanced out the window to see the Humvee sitting in the middle of the road. “Means we’re making good time, right?”

“Or she didn't,” Joe pointed out.

* * *

Four cars and a whole lot of _nothing_  later, Zelda found herself in the remnants of Columbus. She ditched the car she’d been driving—some fuel efficient Chevy with a full tank and a key in the glove box—and started walking towards the exact sort of places she’d expect Survivors to be congregating.

The first thing she found was a large church, high stained glass windows and old red brick making it look even older than the church building in DC. _Can’t set foot on Holy Ground._  Seemed as good a place as any to start.

She walked up to the front door and knocked loudly, hoping that anyone within the walls could hear. Immediately after, she backed up a few steps and held her hands up in surrender.

Moments later, the heavy door opened, and a young woman with a mane of wild red hair was standing in front of her, a sharp kitchen knife held in front of her defensively. “State your name, origin, and purpose,” she commanded.

“Zelda, Washington DC. I’m looking for something.”

“One of Murdock’s friends?” the redhead asked, lowering the knife minutely.

Zelda nodded. “Traveling with six men, as of leaving Murdock in Quantico. Picked up two since.”

The knife was at her throat in an instant. “Singer warned us you might be coming,” she snapped. “Said you’d be looking for shelter. Said we shouldn’t give it to you.”

“You lost me at Singer,” Zelda said honestly. “You don’t have what I need. I’ll leave you to your base, but please don’t try to stop me from leaving.” She backed away slowly, making no sudden moves and keeping her hands in plain view of the other woman.

When she’d crossed the street, the redhead called out, “What are you looking for?”

“I’ll tell you once I’ve found it,” Zelda called back, already turning and walking further into the city.

So it continued, Zelda finding bases and groups, and being told that Blurryface had warned everyone in the area about her.

“If you can hear me,” Zelda said quietly, ducking into an alleyway, “if you can talk to Josh. Tell him Blurryface knew we were coming here.” It was a long shot, but she felt like it was important that the others know that they were expected.

The sun began to set, and while Zelda understood that she needed to find this person quickly, she also knew that they both needed to be alive. And alone in the streets of a big city after dark was not the way to keep herself and the other woman alive for very long at all.

She found herself an apartment complex, one she’d checked earlier for Survivors but turned up empty handed. She went inside and started looking for an apartment that was already unlocked and had a decent view of at least part of the city. She got up to the third floor, but as soon as she left the stairwell, she froze.

There was someone else up there. She turned around and held up a hand, stopping the other person from hitting her in the back of her head with a wooden baseball bat.

“Nice melee weapon,” Zelda commented. “Take it you don’t get many inhuman visitors.”

“How’d you find me?” the other woman demanded. She looked terrified; jumpy and scared, but also fierce. Like whatever it was she’d been doing in that apartment complex, she’d been doing for so long, she’d do anything to keep being able to do it. She had ragged hair that looked to have been blonde once, tied into a messy french braid.

“Completely by chance,” Zelda said honestly. She’d been more openly honest today than she’d been since her hometown fell. It was draining. “I’m just looking for shelter for the night, unless Singer’s already—“

“You work for Singer?” the woman interrupted. 

Zelda tightened the grip she had on the bat, just in case the other woman was about to swing it again. “Not anymore,” she said hesitantly. “But every other Survivor I’ve run into said Singer told them about me, and he said not to let me in. If you don’t want me here, just tell me and I’ll go. I’ve got more important things than fighting for a roof over my head.”

The woman let go of the bat. “If Singer’s turning everyone against you, it means you’ll want to disappear from him too. Feel free to stay as long as you need.” She turned and started walking down the hall. Zelda stared after her before following.

“What do I call you?” she asked.

“You don’t,” the stranger answered. “I don’t exist. You can have the fifth floor—all the apartments are open and most of them have food and decent beds.”

“Well, I—”

The blonde turned around and cut Zelda off. “I said you could stay, but I need you to understand that I don’t exist. If you get captured, _I’m not here._ ”

“Okay, great,” Zelda intoned. “If it was a year ago, I would have no problem with that. But I’ve recently found that being alone does things to your head, and I don’t want to go back to being alone again.”

“Singer kill your team?”

Zelda paused. “Something like that.”

“Shame. He killed my husband. Now. Goodbye.”

“Wait, just,” Zelda called, as the stranger turned around and started walking away. “One more question. Just one. Do you know anyone else Singer doesn’t know about?”

“Nope,” the blonde called back, not even faltering in her step.

* * *

“Any clues on how Zelda’s faring?” Dallon asked Josh, as they stepped out of the car. Josh had said that’s what Zelda had done as soon as she got to the city, and they all figured that it was probably for a good reason. Brendon was the one who reminded them all what Zelda had said about people killing for a working car. They decided to abandon their own vehicle almost immediately after. 

“Still alive,” Josh supplied. Dallon wasn’t naive enough to think that they could really ask for anything better than that. If she was alive, she’d keep looking. If she got killed, they were all done for.

“Okay, let’s say that she does find this girl,” Ryan started, as they all started walking towards the center of the city. “Nobody actually bothered to explain why exactly this is going to help us.”

“Jenna is Tyler’s wife,” Brendon offered.

“When I first found out that Mark had been killed,” Josh explained, “I went straight to their house. I was talking to Tyler, right by the door, and suddenly I heard Jenna scream. By the time I’d gotten to her, she was covered in her own blood and fading fast. Tyler thinks she’s dead, because I wanted Blurryface to think she was dead. Tyler thinks it was his own hands that killed her, that Jenna died thinking he was the one that killed her. If Zelda can find Jenna, and convince Jenna to come help Tyler, that will give him the strength to fight back.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I mean, it's in the title of the chapter. And besides, who else? Mark? Mark is very much dead. I killed Mark Eshleman. He's dead. (And I feel so very, very bad about it.)
> 
> pyromanicschizophrenic.tumblr.com


	25. We're the New Face of Failure

As soon as Zelda could see the sun coming up over the horizon, she gathered her things and made her way back down the stairs. She needed to find this woman (Josh hadn’t actually given her a name) before the sun went down, or it’d be over. They were facing down Blurryface that night; Zelda didn’t exactly have a lot of time.

“What do you think you’re doing?” the blonde woman from the night before demanded, managing to sneak up behind Zelda in the lobby of the old apartment complex.

“I need to find somebody,” she answered simply. “And unless you have more people in this apartment building, then she isn’t here.”

“Someone else Singer doesn’t know about,” the woman remembered. 

Zelda nodded. “It’s crucial that I find her before the sun goes down. One day, big city, and Singer already knows I’m here. So I’m kind of in a hurry.” Zelda turned and walked towards the main entrance, making it to the door before,

“What’s her name?”

“I was told to call her Miss Believer,” Zelda answered. She wasn’t sure if she should be more suspicious of this stranger than she usually was of people she’d just met. “She’d know what that meant.”

“Singer…didn’t kill your team, did he?”

“No, but it was a close thing.” Zelda turned around. “You’re her, aren’t you?”

“I’m not going by a codename. Call me Jenna.”

“Zelda. Glad to have found you.” Jenna didn’t reply, just watched Zelda nervously. “We should go back upstairs. We have some things we need to talk about.”

* * *

“Josh? Is something wrong?” Ryan nudged Josh warily.

Josh, meanwhile, was staring at the building in front of him vacantly, as if he was looking at something else entirely. He seemed to be concentrating. “They lost her,” he muttered. 

“Who lost who now?” Pete asked, trying to peer into the window. “Doesn’t look like anyone’s in here.”

“The Shadows,” Josh explained. “They’ve lost Zelda.”

Pete turned around to stare at Josh, as did everyone else.

“What do you _mean_ , they lost Zelda?” Joe asked tensely. If someone had taken _Zelda_ , of all people, then what chance did they have?

“They know where she should be,” Josh amended. “But whatever building she’s in, they can’t get into.”

“So she’s in a church?” Pete guessed. “She said—she said that they can’t get into churches, so—” He cut himself off as Josh shook his head.

“There aren’t any churches near where they lost her.”

It didn’t look good, then. Zelda knew better by now than to try to shake the Shadows herself—Josh had told them on the way in that she used the Shadows to pass a message that Blurryface was expecting them. There was no reason for her to have disappeared on her own.

Which meant that someone else had wanted her to disappear.

“Okay, look,” Patrick started off hesitantly. “Zelda’s smart. Maybe she found some Survivors that aren’t listening to Blurryface. Maybe she found Jenna. Maybe, wherever she is, they did some kind of thing that keeps the Shadows and everything else from getting in.”

“And maybe Blurryface caught up with her and she's dead somewhere,” Joe argued. “I’m sure we’ve all figured out what lengths he’d go to in order to keep Tyler right where he is.”

Josh shook his head. “There’s too many options. I can say that wherever she is, she went in willingly. But other than that…” He took a deep breath. “We just have to assume she’ll meet up with us. If she doesn’t…We’ll figure it out.”

* * *

“Josh said he’d already explained it to you.”

Jenna scoffed, standing with her back to Zelda. Zelda was sitting on the ground, staring up at Jenna tiredly. They were so near the end. The only thing in their way was the blonde standing in front of the window.

“Explained it,” Jenna repeated hollowly. “Explained what, exactly? Explained that my husband was _possessed_  by a demon that called itself Blurryface? Well guess what, Zelda?” She rounded on the other woman suddenly. “Tyler was referring to the dark parts of his thoughts as Blurryface _well_  before any of this happened. Since before we got married. So either he’s been _possessed_  for longer than he’s letting on, or he’s not _possessed_  at all.”

Zelda thought about all the songs the others had referenced to in their treehouse. Songs about death and demons, about emptiness and hopelessness, about the desire to simply _give up._

“I think it sounds like Tyler’s always had a darkness in him,” Zelda said finally. “A darkness blacker than most deal with. And he fought it, he’s been fighting it all his life. But one day, he couldn’t fight it anymore, and it overpowered him. It took over his mind and his body. But the light, the light is still there someplace. It spoke to Josh, tried to help him. The light can fight back, it can retake the darkness. So the darkness is trying to snuff out that light.”

“If the light can talk to Josh, why can’t it talk to me?” demanded Jenna.

“Because the darkness needs it to think you’re dead,” Zelda stressed. “And as long as the light believes the darkness, the light has no chance.  _We_  have no chance.”

“And if you’re wrong?”

“We’re going to die anyway,” Zelda pointed out. “We’ll run out of food. We’ll get dehydrated. Something else slow and uncomfortable. So let’s die trying to get Tyler back from the darkness, instead of holed up here doing _nothing_.”

“Okay,” Jenna agreed finally. “Let’s get my husband back.”

* * *

“So…what? Tyler’s supposed to see this concert hall and just…fight back?” Ryan asked. He hadn’t been quite clear on the finer points of the plan, only that they were going to the first stadium venue that Tyler and Josh ever played in Columbus, and that Zelda was supposed to bring Jenna to meet them there.

“He’s supposed to _remember_ ,” Josh corrected. “Remember the feeling of so many people shouting his words back at him, remember the realization that he has _helped_  so many people. Tyler was always happiest on stage with his fans, it’s why he goes into the crowd so much. He never wants there to be any less participation with the fans than there was when we started in small venues.”

Ryan looked out at the empty seats, and his heart just _hurt_. He’d been like that once, so thrilled to have people shouting _his_  words back at him, never more happy to be on stage with his best friends. And then he got greedy.

God, when this was over, he was going to apologize to Brendon and Spencer every single day. And if they died here, then his final words would be _I’m sorry._

Brendon sidled up beside him, as everyone else sat on the stage to wait. “Did you ever wonder why I never changed the name?” he asked, sitting on the edge of the stage, legs dangling over. 

Ryan shook his head as he sat beside him. “Never cared to know why,” he admitted. “I was just pissed with every new album you and Spence dropped. Especially after Spencer left.”

Brendon huffed a laugh. “I’d be pissed too,” he agreed. “I did it for you, actually. I never wanted them to stop screaming your words. I kept hoping, maybe you’d come to a show. You’d see that those things you wrote, before we met, when you were just an moody teenager, those things still mattered to people. If I changed the name, if I stopped being Panic! at the Disco and decided to just be Brendon Urie, I couldn’t sing your words anymore. Nobody else could sing your words anymore. And you’d come to a show one day, and all you’d see were people who’d gotten over you.”

“Did Spencer know?” Ryan asked, after a moment of stunned silence. He never would have expected that sort of thing from Brendon back then.

Brendon shook his head. “After you kept brushing him off, he just…gave up. Started trying to move on from you the way you’d clearly moved on from him. I didn’t want him to know that I was refusing to let everybody else move on.”

Ryan didn’t say anything. He didn’t know if he should.

“You came from LA,” Brendon said suddenly. “Do you know if—”

“I don’t know who survived and who didn’t,” Ryan cut him off. “And even if I had gone through looking, I don’t know that I’d have had the strength to check on Spencer. I don’t think I would’ve been able to stomach seeing him at all, alive or…otherwise.”

“He’s smart though,” Brendon pointed out. “He was the mom friend, remember?”

Ryan smiled. “Yeah,” he agreed. “Yeah, he was. Hated it when we pointed it out, though.”

“Oh, yeah, he did,” Brendon remembered with a laugh. “And then Jon came in and said he’d be our dad.”

“Do you think Spence would come back if we asked?”

Brendon looked over to Dallon, who was talking with Josh about something on the other side of the stage. “He might,” he said softly. “But we can’t get rid of Dallon.”

Ryan shook his head. “Jon’s happy,” he assured Brendon. “I’d been talking to him more, right before all this. He’s didn’t think he’d want to come back. I doubt that’s changed, but you could probably start talking to him again.”

“You, me, Spencer, and Dallon,” Brendon thought aloud. “Panic would be a full four people again.”

“Plus, me and Dallon have already bonded,” Ryan pointed out. “So we’re already friends.”

Suddenly, they heard the door to the venue slam closed, and Ryan’s blood ran cold. He saw that Brendon’s smile slipped from his face, and all of them were on their feet in an instant.

* * *

“The sun’s setting,” Jenna noted. “We should get shelter before it’s gone.”

Zelda shook her head. “We need to get to the others before it’s gone.” And she took off running.

“Starting to regret coming with you,” Jenna snapped, taking off after Zelda.

* * *

“We’re missing someone,” Blurryface noted, pointing at each person on the stage as if counting them one by one. Josh glanced to the door. Blurryface was early, yes, but Zelda was also running late. He began to worry that she hadn’t been able to find Jenna. “Oh, that’s right! Where’s Zelda?”

“Why’s it matter?” Pete demanded. “What good is she to you, now that she knows who you are?”

Blurryface shrugged. “No good to me, maybe, but a lot of good to you all. And that. Well, now. That just won’t do.”

“Then isn’t it unfortunate that we actually don’t know where she is,” Patrick asked dryly.

Blurryface’s eyes narrowed. “I don’t appreciate being lied to.”

“He’s not lying,” Josh defended. “We lost track of her right around sundown last night. We have no idea what happened to her.”

Blurryface threw up his hands in exaggerated exasperation. “You gain full control of my most powerful minions somehow, and you still can’t keep track of your best ally.”

Pete shifted. “Yeah, that sounds…” he muttered. “Not good.”

“Unbelievable, is how it sounds,” Ryan agreed. “But regardless, we _don’t know_  where she is.”

“But I’m sure you all know what she’s up to, don’t you?” Blurryface prodded. “What she was doing before she just…vanished?”

“‘Course we do,” Brendon admitted proudly. Josh noticed Dallon and Ryan both looked like they had just given up with him. At least _Pete_  kept quiet. “But tell me: why would we tell you?”

“You’ve got me,” Blurryface deadpanned. “Completely trapped in a corner.”

Josh heard a creaking, looked up, and noticed the lighting structures coming loose. “LOOK OUT!” he shouted. He saw everybody scramble madly as the lights came crashing to the stage. 

“Now, I’m only going to ask one more time,” Blurryface said lowly. “Where. Is. Zelda?”

“Late to the party, it would seem.”

Josh looked up, seeing Zelda crossing the floor behind Blurryface. His heart sank when he saw that she was alone. 

“Not that I can be blamed,” she added. “This place is a maze to get into. Couldn’t figure out which door, and once I got in, I just could _not_  figure out how to get to the floor.” She stopped in the middle. “So, which one was it that irritated you to the point of bringing down the lights? Was it Pete? It was probably Pete.”

“Not this time,” Pete called. Josh could tell that everyone else was relieved to see Zelda there, but totally hopeless seeing her without Jenna. “It was all Brendon’s fault.”

Zelda shrugged. “That was my second guess.”

“Yes, this is all fascinating,” Blurryface said dismissively, rolling his eyes. “Perhaps you’d like to share why you’re late joining us?”

“Well, I mean, as I said, the place is like a maze, blah blah, you know, I’ve never actually had the chance to go to a stadium concert before, especially not on the floor, so really I can't be blamed for—”

“You were my _favorite_ ,” Blurryface interrupted. Josh couldn’t tell, because his back was to the stage, but it sounded like he was pouting. “You did everything I told you to do, when I told you to do it. So quick, so efficient. So _heartless_. Whatever happened to _that_  Zelda?”

“Don’t task someone with saving the world if you want them to fail,” Zelda said flatly. “Especially when you’re sending her in with a group of people who refuse to let her remain apathetic to her surroundings.”

Blurryface shrugged. “Well, you have failed. I have absolutely no idea what it is you all led me here for, but whatever it is, it didn’t work.”

Josh glanced to all the others. They could pretend all they wanted, but Blurryface was right. With Zelda’s arrival, and without Jenna’s, their fate had been sealed. Josh wasn’t sure how much the memories of their fans would help Tyler fight back, especially since a good portion of the Clique had come in with the release of Blurryface (the album).

“We’re, uh…We’re coming to realize that now, actually,” Pete said, kicking tentatively at the lighting fixture. A piece popped off, clattering on the ground. “But we’re already committed to help Tyler or die trying, so I guess we’ll just have to wing it.”

“Someone put a muzzle on him,” Zelda muttered. “I am _really_  tired of hearing his stupid voice.”

“Actually,” Blurryface said thoughtfully, turning around to face them again, “how about I kill him first?”

“To cause him maximum pain, kill him near the end,” Zelda offered. “He really cares about his friends.”

“Zelda, what the _fuck_?” Patrick demanded. Zelda just shrugged.

“You know,” interrupted a voice that Josh knew well, even though he hadn’t heard it in a while, “watching this interaction, it’s a wonder more people didn’t find you out.”

Blurryface’s head snapped up to stare into the stands, as did everybody else’s. Josh’s heart soared, though she was half hidden in shadows and her hair looked dirtied and blood-stained. She was _there_ , and she was _alive_.

“Jenna,” he breathed.

“Impossible,” Blurryface hissed. “You. Are. _Dead_.”

“Why, because you couldn’t find me?” Jenna asked, standing up and leaning over the barrier that separated the seats from the floor. “Singer was a clever trick. Pretending to be some kind of leader for everyone who’d escaped your attacks. But you know what mistake you made? You made it too obvious. You think I wouldn’t notice a pattern, all these things my _husband_  would have hated? I wasn’t about to let you kill me. So I left. I came back here, refused to talk with any other Survivors, and you know what? I’m the best one. I’ve been surviving since you possessed Tyler in the first place. And I will survive longer.”

“You genuinely believe that,” Singer said. “That’s what’s going to make this work for me.” He raised his hand, and the flickering of a flame started, and began to spread rapidly.

Directly behind Jenna.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I have absolutely no idea about the real reason Brendon's still using the name 'Panic! at the Disco,' but I doubt it's so that Ryan Ross has something to come back to. But I can bullshit my way out of anything, it's how I've managed to get through some of my college courses.
> 
> Also, feel free to scream. At me, at the story, in general. I'm always screaming. I scream as much as Thomas Sanders.
> 
> pyromanicschizophrenic.tumblr.com for all your cute animal needs (actually, I've been posting a lot more about myself, also, if that appeals to you at all)


	26. I Need Your Help to Take Him Out

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Tyler's not possessed. Tyler was never possessed.

“Hey, since we are, once again, about to die, can I have my sunglasses back?” Pete called to Zelda. Almost immediately, he felt himself flying through the air, until he hit the wall around the floor area and crumpled to the floor. “Or Blurryface can have them,” he wheezed, bringing an arm to his shoulder. He could feel the heat from the flames growing more intense as the fire spread. Moving would be a good idea.

“Who wants to be next to die?” Blurryface asked grandly. Pete could hazily see him holding his arms out, like the ringmaster of a dark circus. “After the wife and the annoying one, that is. Should it be Josh? What does Tyler think?”

Pete sat up and blinked back waves of pain. Blurryface was holding a finger to his temple, clearly listening to Tyler’s consciousness screaming.

“Hm, yes, I could kill Zelda first.” He turned to Zelda. “He doesn’t actually know you, it’s nothing personal. Same with him,” he added, pointing over at Ryan. “Actually, no, who the hell is this guy? How have I never heard of you?” he demanded.

Ryan shrugged. “Flawed intel system?” he guessed.

Pete staggered to his feet as Blurryface stared at Ryan. Jenna was still alive, running along the wall and away from the flames. As long as Blurryface was focused on the stage…

Pete started towards Jenna, trying to be quiet about it. Zelda noticed, and started in the same direction.

“I see you two, sneaking away back there,” Blurryface called out. Pete froze for half a second, then sprinted to where Jenna was. As soon as he and Zelda were under her, Jenna jumped.

And flew, crashing to the ground just in front of Blurryface.

“For someone so determined to stay alive,” Blurryface hissed, crouching down to be at Jenna’s level, “you seem so awfully desperate to die.”

“I am desperate to let Tyler know,” Jenna corrected, propping herself up just enough to look Blurryface in the eye. “There is no point to living in this world you’ve created, not if Tyler thinks I’m dead.”

“But now you’re going to die anyway,” Blurryface said. “And poor Tyler will be right back at square one again.”

Jenna shook her head, smiling. “No, no he won’t.” She seemed so sure—far more certain than Pete was, at that point. It had all seemed to make sense on paper, but in practice this plan barely held water. “See, the thing is, I know this time. I know, and Josh knows, and all of Tyler’s friends that are here today know. We know that this _isn’t_  Tyler. And we know what _you_  are capable of. But we’re here anyway, lined up to die. But we won’t. Because we know what you’re capable of, but Tyler is capable of so much more.”

“Rivoting,” Blurryface intoned, standing up. He kicked Jenna sharply in the ribs, then turned to Pete and Zelda. “You two. You two are going to die first. You know why? Because I want this _bitch_  to know just how _wrong_  she is.” He kicked Jenna again. It hurt Pete’s heart to watch.

“Whose plan do you think this was?” Pete asked. He did, however, step away from the wall behind him, which was starting to burn closer to the ground. “Jenna said it herself: we _all_  know what you’re capable of, Tyler.”

“Tyler, how many of your songs have been about defeating your demons?” Brendon added, clearly catching on to Pete’s plan. “I mean, that’s exactly what Ode to Sleep was about.”

“Holding Onto You had the line about turning your noose into a leash,” Patrick supplied.

“All of you had better stop talking,” Blurryface growled. “Or you will all wish you were still in that treehouse.”

“What’s a kitchen sink to you?” asked Dallon. “What’s your logo mean?”

“Don’t let the lion win, Tyler,” Andy said. “‘Sometimes, to stay alive, you’ve got to kill your mind.’”

“I. Said. _STOP!_ ” Blurryface shouted. 

“You don’t wanna be heard?” Joe asked. “You wanna be listened to? We’ve been listening, Tyler. Everyone has. Thousands of people, you’ve helped them. They’ve all been listening to you.”

The flames started spreading faster, forcing Pete and Zelda closer to Blurryface. The fire started towards the stage as well, prompting a huddle around the demon. It wasn’t ideal, but it would work.

“I don’t have a specific song reference,” Ryan admitted. “But I know how much you’ve impacted your fans. How many people who’ve listened to your words and thought, _‘I can get through this.’_ You can get through this, Tyler. You aren’t alone.”

“Say ‘peace will win, fear will lose,’” Pete whispered in Zelda’s ear.

“What?” she hissed back.

Pete didn’t reply, just nudged her.

“Peace will win,” she repeated. “Fear will lose.”

“Peace will win, fear will lose,” Dallon said again. Soon, everybody—Zelda, Ryan, Brendon, Dallon, Pete, Patrick, Joe, Andy, Josh, and Jenna—were reciting those six words like a mantra. Pete could tell Zelda still had no idea what it meant, but the louder Blurryface screamed at them to stop the more clear it became that it was working.

“NO!” he roared suddenly, crouching over and clutching his head in his hands. The flames died instantly, leaving the room dark and cold.

Sobs echoed throughout the auditorium, each one reverberating and resonating painfully. Pete felt every single sob deep in his soul, like an ache that settled over his bones.

Everyone except Jenna and Josh backed away, thinking it best to let those closest to Tyler help him.

Pete could hear them both muttering “ _It’s okay, it’s over,_ ” over and over again, but that didn’t settle the way his stomach seemed to be twisting itself into knots.

He couldn’t find it in him to be surprised when they heard the first _slam_  of the door.

* * *

The stadium dissolved into chaos almost immediately. Tyler/Blurryface’s eyes were flickering back and forth between warm brown and cold red, but the fire never started back up and he never tried to attack them, even when the eyes stayed red for more than a minute. In fact, Tyler/Blurryface was huddled in the corner, near the burned stage, with Jenna trying to help Tyler keep control. Josh looked like he wanted to help too, but as more Pawns and Brawlers and Shepherds and the Brigade appeared, waves coming and coming and cornering the others, he was left with no choice but to call on the Shadows and just hope like hell they’d come through.

Immediately, the room got darker as the Shadows writhed and twisted, coming in and picking off a few of the enemies at a time. In the meantime, the others kept fighting, trying for nothing more than to _survive_.

And Tyler didn’t notice any of it. He didn’t notice as his friends got thrown around and torn apart. Inside his head was a war unlike any he’d ever written about, unlike any that history had ever known. 

_They don’t actually care about you, you know._

_**You can’t do this to me. Not anymore.** _

_/Don’t you get it? If they get rid of me, they save the world. It has nothing to do with saving you./_

_**There’s only so convincing you can be when pretending to care about somebody.** _

_That’s not true at all, though, is it? After all, how did I come to be so powerful? Because I told you that I could make you greater, stronger, more powerful, didn’t I? I cared about you, about the pain you felt through school. Convinced you to take your pain to the page, to forget about basketball. I brought you here, because I pretended to care. And you believed me._

_**You never convinced me that you cared. You convinced me that I could change the world.** _

_And you did, didn’t you? I never lied about that. Look at this world we created together, Tyler._

_**We didn’t do this together. I had no part in it.** _

_You did, though. Fed me, helped me. I’ve always been here, Tyler, is what I’m trying to say. And without you, I’d never have made it out here. And without me, the world would all be alright._

_**Without you, I wouldn’t be here, either.** _

_And I—what was that?_

**_You just said you convinced me to write music, not play basketball. If I hadn’t started making music, I never would have met Josh. I never would have met Jenna. Everyone who’s here today, they are here because you promised me that if I made music, I could do great things. And you were right. There are thousands of people who are alive because of my words, and now they are dead because of your actions. So if you_ think _that I am going to let you force me to sit back and watch as you kill them again, you are so sorely mistaken._**

* * *

To say that Josh was scared was an understatement. There were hundreds of them by now, coming through in waves. They seemed to be concentrating on him, noticing that he was the one controlling the Shadows. Kill him, and they could kill _everyone_. The others were working with the Shadows well enough to protect Josh, Tyler, and Jenna, but there was only so long that they’d be able to keep it up.

What was worse, Josh had no clue what was going to happen once Tyler managed to get rid of Blurryface. He had no idea if Blurryface’s nightmare hoard would follow him back to hell, or wherever it was he came from. For all he knew, even when Blurryface was gone for good, these things would keep coming, and all of them would die there anyway. Who knew what these things would be like without anybody to control them?

“ _ENOUGH!_ ” 

Josh turned around to see Tyler, on his feet and eyes back to their warm brown, albeit more scared than Josh had ever seen him. More surprising though, was the way that all fighting had stopped (even their friends had stopped to stare at Tyler).

Tyler looked around the stadium uncomfortably and took a shaky breath. “Your master is defeated. You will leave this plane and return to the plane you came from.”

Immediately, the stadium was empty. Nothing except for eleven bruised and battered humans and a few twisting shadows. They formed into one of the girls and Tyler stared at her suspiciously.

“I said—”

“That one’s…mine, technically,” Josh explained, holding up a hand. Tyler looked up at him. “Is it…Are you really back?”

Tyler’s eyes filled with tears. “I’m so sorry, Josh.” He looked down at Jenna. “You…You didn’t just come because you knew helping me defeat him would save the world, right?”

Jenna, who was still in her crouched position from when Tyler was curled up on the ground, stood up. “No, Tyler, of course not. I came to help you. We all came to help _you_. Nobody here came here for anything other than _you_.”

“Well,” Zelda interrupted. “I mean, I’ve never met you, so. But they all…They seemed to believe in you. So.”

“Okay, Zelda’s here to save the world,” Pete allowed. “But in her defense, the fact that she’s trying to save anybody is a fucking miracle.”

“I can still kill you,” Zelda reminded him.

Josh looked out at everybody, slowly staggering to their feet and checking over themselves and each other for serious damage. But everybody was… _alive_.

He looked back at Tyler. “We’re here for you, Tyler. Everything I’ve been doing since I found out, I’ve been doing for you.”

“He kept me alive, Tyler,” Jenna added. “And he kept me informed. As soon as I was awake, he told me that it wasn’t you. That it was never you.”

“But it was,” Tyler argued. 

“Tyler—” Josh started, but Tyler shook his head.

“It _was_  me,” Tyler repeated. “It’s complicated, but me and…we’re the same person.”

“What do you mean?” Dallon asked softly.

“Before we settle down for a long explanation,” Ryan cut in. “This stadium is probably not the most structurally sound place to be in right now. We should probably go somewhere that wasn’t on fire less than an hour ago.”

* * *

“He’s always been there,” Tyler began. They were in the apartment complex Jenna had been hiding in, up on the very top floor. Zelda and Ryan were flitting around, dressing wounds and setting broken bones. “In the back of my head. Everybody has something like that, I think. That part of your mind that’s fascinated with pain, with death. And he told me that my pain, it was extraordinary. And I should write it down, I should turn it into words. I should put those words to music.

“I didn’t want to, at first. I loved basketball, I hated that voice. But it promised me so much. It said that if I wrote my pain down, that I could be this amazing person. I could change the whole world, I could make a difference. And…I wasn’t going to do that, playing basketball. Music, music changes people. Music reaches people. Sports? If you don’t like sports, then you don’t know who anybody is. Not unless they expand their horizons. And…being somebody to so many people, it just. I took my pen and I started to write.

“And I _did_  help people. I know that. And…I think that’s where it went wrong. Because that’s all he told me he wanted for me. To be somebody, to help other people. He told me I could change the world, and then…And then I _did_. I started to. And I started to think…Maybe, maybe this voice, it isn’t…Maybe he’s not that bad.” Tyler shook his head as he picked at the holes in his jeans. “I was wrong. I was _so_  wrong and now…”

“Tyler, you didn’t do anything wrong,” Jenna said softly.

“I gave him power, Jen,” Tyler argued. “He came out because I _let_  him come out. You can’t tell me that none of this is my fault because if I had just kept _fighting_ —”

“He tricked you, Tyler.” Surprisingly, it was Zelda who spoke. “He made you think it was the right thing, very obviously the right thing.”

“I’m sorry for what he did to Hunter,” Tyler muttered, glancing up at where Zelda was checking out a nasty gash on Brendon’s side. “That was the first time he personally targeted anybody that wasn’t close to me, I didn’t…I gave him the idea, I think.”

“He needed to motivate me,” Zelda said distantly, grabbing the stitching needle. “What better way than to kill the man I loved?”

“He needed you alone,” Tyler corrected. “Motivated, too, but alone.”

“Either way, that absolutely wasn’t your fault,” Zelda assured him. “I don’t think it was anything to do with the fact that it was you. Any human cares about their loved ones. Killing your friends made you putty in his hands. Killing mine would do the same thing.”

“Wait, so, you’re saying…This could have happened to any of us?” Andy asked suddenly, looking over at Tyler.

Tyler shrugged. “I don’t really know, to be honest. I mean, I guess?”

“Zelda said, earlier, that everybody has darkness?” Jenna supplied. 

Zelda took a deep breath, beginning to stitch up Brendon’s side. “Basically, a very cliche light-and-dark thing. Good and bad in every person, and most people exhibit a combination of them both. But from what I’ve been told…”

“Yours was really dark, Ty,” Josh concluded.

“Blacker and louder than anybody else has had to deal with,” Zelda confirmed. “And if I’m right, then you have got to be the strongest person I have ever met.”

Tyler shook his head. “Did you miss the part where I failed? The part where Mark’s dead and the world is in tatters?”

“Tyler—” Brendon tried, voice tight with pain.

“You’re all like this because I _failed_. What strength are you seeing? Nothing I’ve done—”

“How old were you when he took control?” Zelda asked.

“Twenty-six,” Tyler answered. “But—”

“But _nothing_ ,” Zelda interrupted. “For twenty-six years, you fought him. Didn’t let him take control. And maybe you listened to him, but you never let him control you. And when you did, you were able to fight him back. You were able to come back, and now you’re here. You, not Blurryface.”

“You all helped,” Tyler reminded her.

“Ty, we just reminded you that you had something to fight for,” Josh pointed out. “You’re the one that actually did the fighting.”

“Zelda’s right,” Dallon added. “You’re the strongest person any of us have ever met.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Look, nobody died! It's a Christmas miracle (and it's after Thanksgiving, so I'm allowed to say that)!
> 
> Next chapter, basically an epilogue. I like epilogues. They tie everything together in happy little bows. Everybody makes it home! 
> 
> pyromanicschizophrenic.tumblr.com. You'll need it.


	27. And in the End, I Think You're my Best Friend

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> If I didn't write it in, nobody died.

After a few days to recuperate, the entire group decided it was time to (finally) return to their families. Pete, Brendon, Ryan and Dallon set out together, since they were all going to LA. Patrick and Andy went with them for part of the way, but Patrick left them before they left Ohio and Andy split off from them somewhere around the mountains. Joe headed eastward alone, but Josh had sent the Shadows to go with each of them, on the lookout for any remaining threats. Tyler, Jenna, and Josh all went through Columbus, checking in on family and remaining friends. Zelda…Zelda just disappeared.

* * *

Almost immediately, Pete regretting not agreeing to staying together, choosing instead to go home alone. Looking at the shambles of the front door, it became apparent that he might not see what he wanted to see at all. He took a steadying breath and stepped forward.

Not even two steps into the house, the stench of death was obvious. Pete choked, staggering further into the house. “No,” he rasped out. “God, no.” He followed the smell to the kitchen, where…

“Megan, _no_ ,” Pete whimpered, kneeling down beside her. The rancid scent of rotting flesh overpowered all senses, and Pete couldn’t see straight for the grief. “God, no _why_?” He reached down to move her hair from her face, but quickly retracted his hand when the skin on her cheek gave way under his fingertips. “Bronx,” he remembered, standing abruptly. “Saint.” He made his way through the rest of the house, calling for both his kids as he went. 

After somewhere near twenty minutes of searching and finding _nothing_ —no sign of his boys anywhere and the still-constant reminder that his _girlfriend_  was _dead_  in the next room—Pete just collapsed against the wall in the living room. Too late, he was too late, they were too late. 

If they’d just kept going, if they hadn’t stopped in Quantico, if they’d been able to get out of the treehouse faster, if they’d even  _tried_  to get out of the treehouse, if they hadn’t stayed in that stupid house for fucking _ever_  before deciding to go to Columbus, then maybe, _maybe_  Megan wouldn’t be…Maybe Bronx and Saint wouldn’t be missing, maybe…

“After everything,” he mumbled, burying his face in his hands. “After everything, it was for nothing.”

* * *

Pete stayed curled up against the wall for hours, crying until his eyes ran dry and his head was pounding. He didn’t even notice when someone came into the house.

“Pete,” Ryan said softly. Pete felt someone sit down beside him. “Pete, I’m sorry.”

Pete sniffled, turning his head to look over at Ryan. “She’s in the kitchen.”

“And the boys?”

Pete shrugged. “I don’t know, they aren’t here.”

Ryan was silent for a moment. Pete couldn’t tell what he was thinking. “How’s…How are you?” Pete asked softly.

“All my friends I made after I left Panic are dead,” Ryan offered baldly. “But, I mean. That happened before I found you all, so. I haven’t gone to Spencer’s yet. Me and Brendon are going to do that together, after he and Sarah are done celebrating their reunion.”

“Any ideas on Dallon?”

Ryan was silent. He stood up. “Let’s see if we can find your sons,” he said finally.

* * *

“Dallon, thank _God_ ,” Breezy said breathlessly, wrapping Dallon in a tight hug. No sooner than the bassist had walked through the front door, he was accosted by his wife.

“I can’t tell you how happy I am to see you, Breeze,” Dallon whispered, hugging her back just as tightly. Over her shoulder he could see Knox, sleeping on the couch. After a long while of clinging to his wife, he pulled himself away, keeping a hold of her hand, and walked over to his son. “Hey,” he whispered, gently shaking Knox’s shoulder.

Knox blinked his eyes open slowly, then shot upright like a bottle rocket. “Dad!” he shouted, surging forward and latching onto Dallon’s neck for dear life. 

Dallon started laughing, bordering on hysteria, from relief. He glanced back at Breezy and asked, “Where’s Amelie?”

The atmosphere in the room dropped. Breezy’s face fell and Knox let go of Dallon and slumped back into the couch.

“Breezy,” Dallon muttered, shooting to his feet. 

“There were no hospitals,” Breezy explained hollowly. “One day, she…she was complaining about her stomach, kept saying it hurt. I…I did everything I could, thought it was just stomach cramps or something. A couple days later, the pain went away. Next thing I knew, she was running a fever and she just kept getting worse.”

Dallon shook his head rapidly, needing to sit down on the couch to compose himself. “No,” he whispered. “No, this isn’t…This isn’t funny, this is…”

“She worried about you,” Breezy said softly, kneeling down in front of him. “Kept asking me when you’d come home. She was always saying that she hoped you’d make it back.”

“I wanted to come back to all three of you,” Dallon breathed. “That’s what I fought for.”

“I know,” Breezy assured him. “I wanted you to come home to all three of us, Dallon, I did. We tried everything, we tried so hard.”

From what Breezy had said—her stomach hurt, it didn’t hurt, she had a fever—it sounded like Amelie’s appendix had burst. If that was the case…

There really was nothing that they could have done.

* * *

Pete didn’t see a point in searching the house for a thousandth time, so he let Ryan dig around, looking for any sign of the boys that he could get. He heard Ryan talking the whole time, just a string of nonsense Pete supposed was meant to distract him from the fact that the scent of his girlfriend’s rotting corpse was still stinging his nose, but it didn’t really do that much if it was. That’s why, when Ryan’s tone suddenly changed, Pete didn’t notice at first. He was just trying to hold it together long enough not to climb on top of the roof and leap off. 

Ryan came back, then, holding a dirty sheet of paper and looking far more hopeful than Pete thought appropriate.

“Here,” he said softly, holding the paper out to Pete. Pete made no move to take it. “Pete, read it,” Ryan urged.

Slowly, hesitantly, as if it might disappear if Pete put too much stock into it, Pete reached out and took the paper, needing a moment before he was able to actually comprehend what he was looking at.

There was ink, the glistening blue of the gel pen Megan kept for writing notes and shopping lists. It was faded with time, the paper already aged yellow around the edges, but the writing was still perfectly legible.

_boys safe with me. sry about Megan._

_—Ashlee_

“I don’t…” Pete started. How old was this note? Were the boys still safe? Was Ashlee still safe? What if Ash had written this, only to be stopped on the way back to her place? What if they weren’t even _at_  her place?

“I know,” Ryan said quietly. Somehow, Pete believed him. “But it’s a start.”

* * *

Joe always understood that his house was far bigger than it needed to be. Too big for just him, Marie, and Ruby, especially since he was hardly ever home and his girls joined him a good portion of the time. But he was a rockstar, so he felt a superfluous house should be allowed.

Now, though, the house loomed larger than it ever had. Before, there had been the laughter of his baby girl, the hums and giggles of his wife, the playful barks of his dog, and the ever present ambient sound of a happy and peaceful family.

Joe’s house was too big, and the silence echoed louder than any amount of sound ever could. There was no laughter, no barking, no humming. Only the hushed mourning of two parents and the pained whining of a lonely, hungry dog, whose best playmate was gone.

* * *

Ashlee’s house didn’t look very promising when Pete and Ryan stopped in front of it. The door was off its hinges and the windows were all smashed and broken—in some cases, there wasn’t any glass at all. The entire walk had been filled with Ryan’s hushed tones, telling Pete about all the things that hope had gotten them—it had brought them all home, it had brought Jenna back, it had saved _Tyler_ —about how Pete just had to have a little bit more hope, for just a little bit longer. Staring at his ex-wife’s derelict house, Pete hoped Ryan was choking on his words and hope now.

Ryan didn’t say anything else, just walked up the once-tidy pathway that led to the front door. Pete followed wordlessly, even though all he really wanted to do was turn and run. He saw Ryan pause at the unhinged door, before he _knocked_.

Pete waited with bated breath, until slowly— _finally_ —the door moved, revealing a defiant and gaunt Ashlee Simpson, holding an old lamp that Pete remembered her picking out back before Bronx was born as if it was a viable weapon.

Ashlee saw Pete immediately, completely ignoring Ryan standing right in front of her. She put the lamp somewhere out of sight of the doorframe and stepped back. Ryan stepped back, too, letting Pete go first.

As soon as he was over the threshold, he heard two voices shout, “Dad!” before his legs and waist were being constricted by two sets of arms.

Pete sat on the ground so he could hug his boys back, just as tightly, silent tears of relief streaming down his face. He didn’t even notice Ryan turn around and walk away.

* * *

“I just wanted to check on Bronx,” Ashlee explained, much later as Bronx and Saint slept on either of Pete’s sides. Ashlee was sitting in front of Pete, picking at the threadbare carpet. “The world goes to shit, he’s my son, I just…I wanted him with me. I was willing to stay at your place, so I could be with my son and Bronx could be with his brother and Saint could be with his mother. I didn’t know you weren’t there, too. But I got there, and…It looked fresh. Just happened. Saint was trying to wake her up. Obviously I was taking Bronx with me, but I couldn’t just leave Saint by himself. When they told me that you had been out playing a show, I wrote a note to let you know that I had them with me.”

“I didn’t actually find it,” Pete confessed. “Ryan did.”

“I didn’t want someone else to see it,” Ashlee explained. “Take it for themselves, or anything like that. I guess hiding it in the kitchen was a bad move, though.”

Pete shrugged. “You probably weren’t thinking all that clearly about where to hide it,” he allowed. “And I got here, at any rate.”

* * *

Months passed. Without Blurryface’s monsters wreaking havoc on everything, things went back to normal with hardly any prodding whatsoever. It was only in the beginnings of summer that the group reunited, on a mostly-empty beach in LA. Everyone listened as everyone explained what had been lost, friends and pets and, in the worst cases, family. Even Zelda, staring at the ocean as if seeing it for the first time, opened up, talking about the sight of her hometown falling to the ground.

Bronx, Saint, Knox, and Declan ran around, shrieking with laughter and sometimes tackling each other into the sand. It was only apparent that they were missing the presence of Amelie and Ruby if anybody looked closely enough. Nobody did. They all felt the absence enough on their own.

Tyler talked about the way that he still had powers, even with Blurryface gone. Tyler and Jenna were helping him work on controlling them. Josh still had command over the Shadows. They were all struggling with the losses. Jenna, especially, still had nightmares, and on those nights, Tyler had to leave her alone, because she’d wake up and think he was still the monster that had started this. And they knew, they both _knew_  that he wasn’t, but it still stung an awful lot, and it hurt Tyler’s heart to hear his wife screaming in another room and not be able to help.

Later, as the sun was setting and the kids were starting to get tired, Brendon said something that surprised everyone there.

“We should start making music again.”

“Save Rock And Roll Tour, Part Two,” Pete suggested.

“Rebirth of the World,” Ryan countered immediately.

Nobody could find any reason _not_  to start making music again, so they all silently agreed. And a few weeks later, after moving past the kinks that come with not playing or singing in something close to a year—longer, for some—it was almost like Tyler Joseph was never possessed in the first place, like Panic! at the Disco hadn’t lost their bodyguard and half the band on stage, like Fall Out Boy never left all their instruments in an abandoned church in Washington, DC.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> First off: I did not decide who to kill. I'm a coward like that. I wrote all the names in a list, numbered it, and told my friend to pick three numbers. Basically, it was randomly generated.
> 
> And that's it. That's another story, finished. After a year and a half, taking an ill-conceived notion and running with it, and I've gotten here. I've dragged Twenty One Pilots into this mess, I've left various others _out_ of this mess...It's been a long adventure, is what I'm saying. This story went through at least four different planned endings, and one of them just got thrown out because I realized that it made zero sense with everything else.
> 
> Obviously, I want to say thank you. This story was a beast, and it never would have been finished if you all didn't read it. It wouldn't have even gone past chapter six or so. You're all my inspiration, the source of my creative motivation. Thank you for reading, thank you for your comments and your kudos and everything in between.
> 
> There is another story in the works. One that will save my soul, as it currently belongs in the ninth circle of hell for killing off TWO CHILDREN. I recommend checking out my tumblr (pyromanicschizophrenic.tumblr.com), because there's going to be a post about the next story there sometime this week, because I want to say some things before it goes up. If you don't want to check out my tumblr, there will be an ultra-condensed version in the first chapter.
> 
> Until next time, my lovelies :D


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